Chapter Twelve

Stepping over the body and into the Engine room, had all the standard characteristics of a working Engine. The ion batteries for the thrusters, the cooling stations to prevent overheating. The electrical substations that handled much of the interface within the ship's daily functions. Interlacing your fingers you stretch your arms out, your knuckles cracking as you begin busying yourself with sabotaging the Engines.

Minutes later you stand back up wiping the oil and sludge from your face. Soon, the engines should overheat and cause them to overload. “The overheating Ion engines will leave a trail. If there was a rescue attempt of any kind, at least they’ll have a trail to follow.” Looking around the room you mulled over the next step. “How do I get a message out?” You mulled over the options but you couldn’t think of any other way but the bridge. That’s the last place you want to go. It’s the only place that would have a communication terminal to relay the message.

“Hey, look, a human escaped, killed a couple of Sandarians and is now on your bridge. Ta-da!” You chuckle to yourself. “Except it’d probably sound something like this, Grug, groooa, rawr!” Your imitation sent you giggling to yourself like a lunatic. “If Helena could see me now, she’d probably experience her first taste of fright.”

“Really don’t have much choice though, do I?” You leave the engine room and turn down a few long corridors. Surprisingly you don’t see any more Sandarians. You wonder mildly if they were sleeping. So far from what you’ve encountered, or lack thereof, it’s just the skeleton crew, which means most are sleeping. That should make it easier to slip in undetected, least you hope and right now everything is riding on that hope. “Let’s just pray it holds out.”

“Far gur rag.” A guttural grunt came from around the bend. The metal grating beneath your feet did little to silence your approach, but thankfully you’re light on your feet. “Jur Jur Daerin?” You slip into a small alcove between the thick pipes that run along the wall. The lights were low and cast many shadows. Carefully throwing your legs over the pipe you slowly and quietly slid down on the other side. Shrinking back and down you made yourself as small as possible, just in time for a pair of Sandarians to walk past your hiding spot and out of sight as they disappeared down the corridor. “That was close.” You’ll have to move fast before the bodies you left behind are found.

A huge sigh of relief escapes your lips when the bridge door comes into view. Hurrying over to the security control panel, ripping the bottom paneling off which is no larger than a remote control, exposing the wires. Grabbing a fistful you yanked them out of the panel causing sparks to flutter about. The door swooshed open in victory. Poking your head inside you didn’t see any Sandarians.

“Strange. No ugly green aliens to stop me. Forget about that. I need to get some sort of message out.” Strangely all of this tech is completely foreign to you. You know engines, but this? Your eyes scan the room at all the blinking lights that lit up various panels. In the center was what looked like a navmap, in front of that looked to be a couple of seats, no doubt for the pilot and copilot. Off along on both sides were even more seats with even more blinking lights on the computers that riddles the entire room. For such a brute race, they certainly know their tech, at least it seems like it.

Throwing your hands up in frustration, “I’m screwed…” You zero hope at figuring this out you decide to just poke around and again, ‘hope’ that whatever you do works. Everything looked ordinarily the same. How were you supposed to figure out which was the comms unit? Right when you were about to give up and come up with a new plan, a certain light caught your attention. It’s very similar to the rest, but for some reason this one drew you to it. It was centered on the Navmap among other bleeping and blipping buttons. Walking over to it you couldn’t see anything that might indicate what it meant or what it would do if you pressed it. Taking a deep breath you pressed the tempting red button in the darkened bridge.

A hologram appeared in the center of the round table. A soldier with recognizable armor stood poised in the center. Their hands behind their back, their voice loud and firm.

“This is Titanus, do you copy? We can get no signatures off your ship, please identify.” You stood transfixed daring your eyes to be true and not deceiving you. Blinking the image still stood before you unable to see you but maybe they can hear you. Looking down at the console before you, you frantically looked for a way to communicate back.

“I repeat! This is Titanus of the Allied coalition. We see no markers on your ship. What is your affiliation? Please respond or we will--” Desperate you pounded the console hitting a slew of buttons, praying they can hear you.

“Titanus! Do you copy? This is Nellita from Engineering, sector 3 Identify, 10035. I’ve been captured by the Sandarians!” There was a static scuffling sound then you saw a wide eyed Helena.

“Nel!? Is that you!? I Knew it! Where are you?” She all but screamed at you. The officer she pushed out of the way isn’t all too thrilled to have been moved from the cocking of his head. The helmets that are standard issue make it so you can’t see their faces, but if you were to guess, he’s got a scowl a mile wide right now.

Helena looked off the screen to her side, her voice was threateningly low. “You touch me one more time and you will lose that hand. I’m not leaving her again!” helena’s beautiful blue eyes turned back to you. Even through the Hologram which dulls the colors, you can tell the tiredness that pulled at her face. You noticed the bags under her eyes, she looked absolutely stunning despite the exhaustion which is clearly eating away at her. She must have been so worried. Your heart fluttered. A smile tugged at the corner of your chapped and bruised lips.

“I’ve missed you Helena, but I think it’s safe to say that you’ve been with me every step of the way.” you hold your knife up and wave it endearingly. “I’m coming for you, Nel. Hold on, I’m coming for you.”