Theseus Standoff

The data stream felt strange. Unfamiliar, but uniform. The information made no sense. Almost like static, ant to occupy my mind rather than actually tell anything at all. I tried to open my eyes, but my vision remained pitch dark, the data still flowing. it felt like the stream was being forced into . Reaching up, I felt around my eyes and felt a tal visor. I felt calm, but curious, uncertain what was happening as I clicked the visor off, letting it float down in the fluid I was floating in. It felt familiar. Core lubricant. But when I opened my eyes, I didn’t see my void. Clear glass sat between and a dozen cylindrical chambers. Each one was filled with other won. They all looked exactly the sa. It was as if I was looking into a series of mirrors. Long brown hair, thin form, each with a dull expression on their face despite their eyes not being visible behind the visors they had. Wires hooked into openings behind them on their necks. They all sat stock-still in their tubes, mouths slightly agape as their ntal functions were drowned out by the digital static being fed to them.

I reached out to the glass and started to pound on it. I didn’t belong here. I had to get out. And after I’d pushed my fist into it several tis, suddenly there was a figure standing before . A man in a suit, though I could discern no details. I was afraid. I backed up into my cylinder, but I couldn’t keep moving away as his hand reached right through the glass, pushing a visor right back onto my face.

—

My eyes opened and I sat up gasping for air, cold sweat running down my face. Another dream. This one had been different, though. As I tried to catch my breath, the heart ca into focus around , and I saw that I didn’t have the ti to ponder what I’d just seen. Across the room from stood Shaw, and I saw him standing over Doc, who had crumpled onto the floor.

As I started to co to my senses, and he tried to make sense of what he had previously thought was the ship core wearing a tropical button-down shirt that had just sat up and made eye contact with him, we both just stared for a long mont. I took in a deep breath to scream, but he ran across the room and shoved his hand over my mouth “Shh-sh-sh, it’s okay. Don’t need to go making noise.” He said quietly, holding his hand out where impossibly, the tallic object he’d held before simply… appeared from nowhere into his hand, and he held it up to . I started to breathe heavily, briefly taking note that he’d closed the door to my heart. I’d never been threatened this directly before. I’d never felt this vulnerable. Was this another nightmare?

I closed my eyes and sent out a general ping to the whole crew ‘Shaw at core. Help.’

“Hey, hey, no. Look at .” He demanded, and I opened my eyes to look into his “I’m not gonna hurt you. And he’s just knocked out. I don’t like killing people that don’t gotta be killed. So listen to and you’re gonna be okay, got it?” I nodded slowly, not wanting to seem like I was trying to break away. “Good. You make any noise now, and I will have to make so bodies though, hmm?” he briefly looked away as a quiet beeping noise ca out into the room behind him. Internally, I cursed myself because I realized that I’d just pinged Doc’s terminal too. Thankfully, he wrote it off quickly. I whimpered as he looked back to and said “Now where’s the core?” he asked calmly “Need to have a word with it, and it ain’t exactly communicative if it’s not in its little cell.”

He slowly let go of my mouth, but still held the blade to my throat to emphasize I shouldn’t scream. I didn’t really know what I could tell him. There wasn’t exactly another core around that I could point to. Aisling had dumped the body of the old one at so point while we were on Luna. He wouldn’t believe if I told him the core was sowhere else on the ship, because why would it be. I was too scared to think that I could defy his questions either. So I did what I had to do. I told him the truth.

“I-I am the core.” I stamred out nervously.

He gave a perplexed look and held his knife back “Girl, you have so serious hardware, but I’ve worked a ship before, you’re no core. They don’t talk.” He muttered and put it right back to my neck “Now I ain’t got much ti, where’s it at?”

I was panicking now. He didn’t believe . But what else could I tell him? I closed my eyes and grasped for sothing, anything “I-I’m not lying. Check that tablet Doc dropped.” I said, my whole body shaking as I tapped into Doc’s terminal and deleted my previous ping, sending a new one that said ‘I’m really the ship core.’ Another beep ca from the terminal right then as it received my ssage.

is the ho of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.

He couldn’t ignore the timing of the ssage this ti. He backed away slowly, still pointing the knife toward , and reached down to pick up the tablet, looking at the ssage. His knife hand lowered slowly “No shit.” He mumbled, to which I pinged it again ‘yes shit.’ And he couldn’t deny it any longer after that.

“Look, if you kill , you’re fucked.” I started, swallowing hard as I tried to collect myself to make a defense, but started talking way too fast “I die and this ship is stranded. Best case scenario, they flag Luna to get hitched back to where we were taking you anyway. Worst case, they can’t cancel the engine thrust and we just going forward forever. You can’t afford to kill .” He wouldn’t have any way of knowing that we were already in orbit, so I figured a bluff like that wasn’t a stretch.

Shaw set the tablet aside, but kept his knife pointed toward , his mouth open as he tried to co up with what to say. I didn’t bla him, how could he have possibly anticipated this? “Well… alright. And I guess if you can pull that trick with this tablet, then you wouldn’t have any trouble-“

There was a tal wrenching noise at the door, followed by a banging sound and the muffled sound of voices. I closed my eyes to see the rest of the crew standing outside, ard. But he’d locked the door from the inside sohow, and if it was electrical, I didn’t have access to it. “-signaling the rest of the crew.” He finished “Well, that complicates things. In a lot of ways. So I can’t kill you. That certainly takes away so leverage.” He admitted.

I closed my eyes and pinged Aisling’s tablet ‘He forced to tell him what I am. He knows he can’t hurt , I should be safe.’ I was jarred back to physical reality, however, when I felt him grab my arm “Co on then. If you’re really the core, back in the tank then. You’re taking back to Earth.”

I pulled my arm away from him “And what if I don’t?” I dared him, crossing my arms. I was very much still scared, but I at least had to put on a front for him.

He didn’t look impressed though. He just turned his knife and gestured toward Doc “Well, what about him? He a critical starship part too? Do it or I kill him.” He shrugged.

I looked past him at Doc, who was still very much unconscious. Well, so much for my advantage. I closed my eyes and read a ssage from Aisling ‘He welded the door shut sohow, we’ll figure sothing out.’

I ssaged ‘He’s threatening Doc if I don’t take him back to Earth. I’ll try to stall the best I can.’ I then sighed and started to unbutton my shirt. This wasn’t going to be easy.

—

I was back in the void, but not under any kind of good circumstances. I took a deep breath of the lubricant and wished that I had the ti to acclimate myself back into things and relax again, It was extrely jarring when I heard tapping on the outside of the tal case. Going right to the sensors in my heart, I heard Shaw calling “Hello. Not just hiding in there, are you?”

I imdiately turned on the intercom “It’s a sensory deprivation tank for a reason, you asshole! Quit hitting it!”

“Whoa!” he backed away from the core module “Easy, girl, just checking. You really are just like, a living core, huh?”

“I am.” I said anxiously “Now shut the fuck up and let work.”

I started bringing the engines back down to turn, but I made sure I was taking my ti with it. Going into the hall outside, I had to see what the rest of the crew was doing. It looked like Mouse was carrying in a cutting torch of so sort. The others were standing far away past the hallway divider, presumably to be out of sight range of the sparks that would be happening.

I tapped Aisling’s tablet rather than the intercom, on the off-chance Shaw would be able to hear through the door ‘I’m in the core module. How the hell did he get out of his cell?’ I asked.

Aisling tapped back ‘He sohow cut through the locking device. I think he must have so kind of tech.’

‘Yeah, I’ve seen him pull that knife out of thin air a couple tis now. I thought it was just a glitch the first ti, but this ti it was right in front of . That any kind of cyberware you’ve heard of?’

‘No. He’s definitely got sothing unique in there. Probably how he’s keeping this door closed too. How’s Doc?’

‘Unconscious, but breathing.’ I was happy to report ‘Should I try to feed him false flight data or sothing?’

‘No, do what he says for now. At this point I’d say kill the fucker, but with Doc in there, that’s not exactly possible for you without taking him out too. This guy’s unpredictable. We gotta play by his rules ‘til we can make an advantage happen.’ She looked visibly aggravated, but her logic was sound. We didn’t lose a whole lot by actually taking him back to Earth if we had to, and there were plenty of opportunities for us to regain the upper hand. ‘Try talking to him. He’s a loudmouth, so he might spill sothing.’

I returned my attention to my heart to see Shaw taking Doc’s body to the back of the room, using as a shield between him and the door. I turned on the intercom and asked “Hey, Shaw. Wanna chat?”