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“May their light shine especially brightly,” I reply softly because I’m already focusing on the Dulu ship, and then I close comms as an afterthought. As we approach the vessel, I nod to my helmsman. He initiates a web from our ship around theirs, bringing us all to a complete stop.
I give the command to my comms officer to hail them. When communication is open, I say, “Dulu vessel, this is the Alliance Force. You are illegally carrying humans from the planet Earth. This is a violation of both Galactic Court and Alliance law. Prepare to be boarded so that we may retrieve the humans, and justice will await you by the Galactic Court.” Thanks to our new deflectors, ironically courtesy of another Dulu ship, these traffickers didn’t have a chance to escape once we knew where they were. Our ship and weapons are far better than theirs.
“No reply,” my comms officer reports.
“I didn’t expect one.” Dulu aren’t much for talking when they’ve been caught. “Grab your weapons. Let’s board them and get this over with. We’ve got to get those humans back to Earth before their legal window for reintegration closes.”
Our stealth ship docks with the Dulu ship. I hear the locks click. Over comms, my helmsman says, “We are joined.” Before we kick in the hatch, I make eye contact with the officers under my command, “May the goddesses protect us as we protect the Lost People.”
My men say the set response in unison, “May their light guide us.”
Then, with a single thud, we kick open the hatch. The Dulu vessel’s corridor is quiet, dark, and deserted. This is typical of Dulu. They’re cowards. We form a line and approach the human life signs on our sensors. I can hear the transponder beeping as we get closer. Most likely, the Dulu won’t give us any trouble now that they know they’re beaten. They also know the GC will go easier on them if they don’t fight now. But something isn’t right about the number of humans they abducted. Dulu usually don’t take more than a couple. These days, the GC has graduated punishments for abductions. The more you take, the worse the crime, and the Dulu prefer to do multiple abductions with the minimum number of abductees.
My men and I move forward and easily unlock the doors to the holding cells. The first thing that hits us is the stench of unwashed bodies, but not all of them are human. This isn’t right. Before I can put my finger on what smells familiar and wrong in this scenario, I hear the first shot. I’d recognize the sound of that kind of weapon anywhere. My leg is hit and sending shockwaves of pain through my body. I yell, “Take cover! Octopods.”
I jump behind a broken air purifier and fire at the Octopods coming in while also trying to grab my med shot from my armor. I find it and stab it in my leg. Immediately, I feel no pain. This will last for a few hours, and if I’m hit again, I won’t feel that either.
I hazard a look to assess our situation. The Octopods I can see are covered in silver armor, making our weapons useless unless we get perfect and precise shots in the few vulnerable areas of their armor—an almost impossible task with their speed and agility. I peek up again through the crossfire and count them. There are seven of them and probably a dozen or so Dulu. But for sure, the Dulu won’t fight once the Octopods are dead.
I signal to my officers to let them get closer to us, and then we’ll shoot and hope they haven’t upgraded their armor in the last months. Judging by the dreary state of this cargo bay, I highly doubt it.
All eyes are on me while my right hand is on my chest with my fist closed. I use my telepathic skills to gauge where the enemy is. Time is moving so slowly as they venture out and towards us. When I feel the Octopods are close enough, I release my fist and yell loudly, “Now, now!”
My well-trained officers and I bravely stand and fire at once, aiming for the most vulnerable parts of their Octopod armor. Our armor can only take a few direct hits. I’m shooting, but I feel like I’m shooting at nothing as my shots fizzle into nothing.
The nearest Octopod puts his strong tentacles on my neck and squeezes hard while his other tentacles reach for my other appendages. My fingers reach for my knife, and as he’s trying to rip my head from my body, I thrust my knife between his armor and his mouth. In and out, I thrust my knife. I know he’s close to killing me, but I don't feel anything because of the med shot. In and out. His foul Octopod blood goes everywhere, including into my mouth, but I don’t stop pumping my knife into the small amount of flesh I can find. Then I pull my gun again and fire near the corner of his eye. For once, my aim is on point, and my shot goes through rather than fizzling. I keep shooting, and his armor is beginning to deteriorate in that area. Once I’ve brought him down, I kick his body to the side and survey my team. I jump in to help my men, and before long, we’ve subdued all of the Octopods and dragged them into a cage as we let the humans out. The fewer Octopods we kill, the fewer questions the GC asks about the Empire’s formal relationship with humanity.
“They must have false sensors too,” one of my men comments, reading the Dulu computer in the cargo bay. “There are more humans here than we had originally thought.”
Now that the fighting is over, I have a chance to survey the cages, and I cannot breathe for a minute. It’s an astronomical number of abductees for such a small group of Dulu and Octopods pirates. Hundreds of humans and animals native to Earth as well. “We’ll have to call for reinforcements. They can’t all go on our ship. We just don’t have enough space.”
The same officer calls Alliance Force and then reports to me, “Ash will come with the Ge directly.” I notify the GC, who are already on their way to collect the Octopods and Dulu on this ship. In the meantime, we seal up the ship and lock it from the outside so that they can neither call for help nor leave on their own without my code. A code that I will only transfer to the GC vessel when it arrives to escort them to GC HQ.
Four
Ivy
There’s a loud bang. It’s so loud it rattles our cages. Something is happening in another area of the ship or building, whatever this is. Then, more sounds and inhuman screeching followed by what sounds like men. Men yelling. Are we being held on Earth somewhere? Is that a foreign military come to save us? Is this some really sick cosplay?
Scarlett and I make eye contact. I see hope in her blue eyes, and she must see the same from me. Please let this be someone to save us. Again, we hear men, definitely men, shouting at one another, and we hear weapons fire. Then what sounds like boots on the metal floor moving towards us. They’re right outside the door. The moment of truth, are they friends or foes? I hear the door slide open with a whoosh, and just when we’re finally going to see who these men are, the bars around our cages suddenly transform into solid walls.
It’s pitch black. I cannot see anything. I bring my hands to my eyes to make sure they are open. I scream, and it feels like everyone around me is also screaming as if on cue from a director in a horror movie. What’s happening now? I’m afraid there’s not enough oxygen. I hear a loud boom, like we have hit something. Another ship? An asteroid? A tank firing at us? I hear yelling in a language I don’t recognize from the other side of the wall, but it’s not the aliens. They don’t talk—more violence outside with weapons and more yelling by the men in an incomprehensible language.
“We must make more noise, not just screaming, or maybe they think we’re only animals,” one of the other women suggests in accented English. “And then they may leave us to die.”
“But what if they kill us?” I reply frantically. “We don’t know where we are or who those people are.”
“Whoever they are, they came to get us,” Scarlett points out. “They know we’re here. It doesn’t matter if we know who they are. That’s irrelevant.”
“Even if they’re evil too, at least it’ll be a quicker death than starving to death here,” the first woman says.
“Or worse, eating each other,” another woman comments from the corner.
Then we all start screaming and banging on the walls of our cage. “We are in here. Help us!”
It seems like an eternity before the walls transform into bars again, and light floods in. It’s blazingly bright, and I must shield my eyes, blinded for a few seconds. When my eyes adjust to the light, I see men dressed in modern science fiction like black armor, their faces hidden with helmets and visors, but they look human-shaped but bigger and stronger.
I also see that we’re in the middle of a military conflict.
