“You’re completely insane,” Jason said as he shook his head. “But we’d be on our way back to the Triton with a lot more dead and wounded if it weren’t for that stunt.”
“I aim to please. Too bad about the suit though,” he looked from the encounter suit to the medic who had been treating him for a moment. “All my important bits where they’re supposed to be?” he asked.
The medic smiled and nodded. “Yes sir. Looks like you’ll be sheep dogging us around the gunnery deck as soon as we’ll get back.”
“Sheep doggin’ — now where’d you hear that?”
“Saw a movie made in New Ireland right before all this started. Most of the Gunnery Crew did,” he replied.
“It All Points North,” another crewman confirmed, naming the picture.
“Good movie, makes us gunnery dregs look like heroes,” Frost smiled.
“Found it in your personal collection and made it public. The preview looked good,” Jason said as one of the Triton soldiers finished cutting through the bolts on a large access panel and let it drop to the side. “There it is, the main trunk line.” He stepped up to the collection of cables and, without a moment’s hesitation, reached into the bundle. A moment later he pulled several silver lines, affixed two boring clamps, verified that he had full contact with the ship systems and then deactivated all ship controls using program he had ready on his command and control unit. “The ship is ours.”
“Aye, as long as we can make sure you can stand right there patched in,” Frost replied, eyeing the way they’d come and the two broad hallways to either side. “Think I might just go get the last good encounter suit.”
“Sir, what will we do about a bridge?” asked Mark.
“We’ll use the one with cracked armour. Damn thing’s probably too fancy to repair in good time anyhow.”
Chapter 36
Ashley watched the movement of Oz's group through the ship as they moved towards the lower decks. They had made fantastic progress with the command deck after subduing the highest ranking enemy officer aboard Triton. The captives were stripped of their gear and sealed in crew quarters, and Ashley couldn't help but ponder the similarity between her situation and that of the captured soldiers.
Zoe kicked in her sleep where she was curled up in the seat beside her. Ashley stroked the youngster's side gently, prompting her to roll over and capture the appendage in an unconscious hug. “Might be a while before I get that back,” Ashley said with a sigh.
There was a lot going on aboard Triton, and even more happening above, in the destroyer outfitted with a Command Module that was still firmly affixed to their dorsal mooring port. Over the last few hours Ashley listened to the chatter as Frost and Jason's teams maintained possession of the lower decks of the ship, and cut main power to the rest. It was both exciting and frightening, listening in on that drama. At times she found herself cringing at the sounds she was overhearing, many of which were never explained, and more than once she was relieved to hear familiar voices after the action was momentarily over.
Taking care of Zoe was more challenging than listening to Jason and Frost's battling egos or their fight with the destroyer’s crew. The toddler had taken the vacsuit Ashley had made for her with her command unit off twice and she'd already gotten bored of survival bars. There was a working materializer just outside in the main medical bay, and she could have gotten more interesting food for them both, not to mention a light blanket or a toy for Zoe, but fear kept her locked inside the conference room. There were no working sensors in medical or the aft section behind it. It would be hours before Oz's people could get there, and for some reason Agameg couldn't contact the former slaves that were fighting past the middle frame of the ship. That was a lot of space left in the dark, and the thought of running into soldiers like the ones she met in medical kept her awake, she didn't need stims.
A knock at the door made her jump so badly she woke Zoe, who looked up at her with wide, bleary eyes. “Uh oh, that's your; 'I'm about to start crying because I'm tired and scared face,'” Ashley said as she carefully picked the youngster up and cradled her against her chest. With a glance she could see that the autopilot was still running, her controls were still locked, and the comm was set to listen only. No one would be able to hear what was going on in the conference room.
“Please unlock the door Ashley,” Larry said through her communicator. “I have a few things for you and Zoe.”
“We're fine thanks,” she replied quietly.
“Listen, I understand how you might have misgivings about letting me in, but I think I've already shown that you can trust me.”
“Oh really?”
“Just a few hours ago I saved you from a pretty bad situation, remember?”
“Because you needed someone to fly the ship.”
“I could have done that myself just fine. I'm sure Oz and Jason would have no trouble believing that I was able to re-route controls to this room and get us on course. I saved you because I know you're a good person, and I couldn't watch that soldier take advantage.”
“Okay, but what guarantee do I have that you won't take me out just to be safe?”
“You watch way too many movies. If that’s what I wanted, I could have opened the door for myself using a terminal down the hall. With the right code I can override anything as long as it still has power. Check for yourself, just bring up a raw code console and enter the word: ‘absolution’ followed by the number four.”
Ashley did as he asked and noticed that the password was assigned to her biometric ident specifically, something Larry would have had to do in advance. Suddenly the three dimensional cut away diagram of the Triton hovering over the table took on a whole new level of detail. Every wire, pipe, hatch, crawlspace and little secret was on open display. She could even see inside the Botanical Gallery. “Oh, well, that's just awesome.”
“Ashley, is everything okay down there?” asked Oz’s voice from the terminal.
“Yeah, I’m fine, why? Something goin’ on?”
“No, your comm signal just squelched then came back under a new priority signal.”
Ashley thought for a moment, unsure of what to say. She didn’t have the know-how to lie about communications, yet she didn’t know how much she wanted to tell Oz. “Um, I dunno, maybe something Jason did?” she blurted.
“Maybe. He’s cabling the Enforcer to the Triton so who knows. You should have flight control of the other ship in a few minutes, by the way.”
“All right, that should make the ship easier to stabilize. Thank you Oz.”
“Oh, don’t thank me, it’s all Jason, Frost and the whole gunnery crew. They’ve taken the whole bottom half of that ship. I’m busy clearing the interior compartments with everyone else.”
“Anything interesting?”
“Not really. I’ll tell you as soon as something comes up though. Talk to you soon.”
Ashley sighed with relief.
“Why didn’t you tell him, Ash?”
“Maybe I’m just getting used to sitting on this fence,” Ashley replied in a harsh whisper. “What was that code stuff all about anyway? You almost forced me to tell him everything.”
“I added you to the system at a higher security level than anyone in the ship. I can show you how to hide your access level, so no one knows anything’s changed.”
“Besides you. Does anyone even know this is possible?”
“As far as anyone knows, there's no way to get all that control and information at once, it comes in bits and pieces with the right security clearances. With that code you override security and your actions can't be recorded, it's how I get around without getting caught.”