23. Getting even pt 1
Riddik had his hands in his pockets and was walking unhurriedly along the access corridor kicking at the small things he encountered along the way. His mood was terrible and his urge to fight, to hurt or maybe even kill something was pretty intense. He had only been away from Keria for about a day but he was unable to go to her and that was what hurt him the most. He kicked a can that had until now been a part of the local scenery and sent it flying down towards a side corridor where it bounced off the bulkhead and disappeared from his view. The can-kicking had an effect, a shuffling of feet could be heard from the corridor and Riddik took his hands out of his pockets. He looked down the side corridor and spotted the two young punks that were bent low over a prone figure. Riddik shook his head and was about to walk on, not his business, when a little voice inside his head reminded him that Keria would scald him for walking on. He sighed and turned towards the youngsters.
"Boys, leave him alone and go home."
The larger of the two youngsters stood to his full size, almost as big as Riddik and spat at his feet.
"Yousa wanna besa de next?"
Riddik smiled at the youngster's feeble attempt at emulating the slang spoken around the self-declared gangsta community at Corvus. The next thing they would do was flick out a pocket vibro blade for sure. The click and slight humming confirmed his theory.
"I shall give you one last warning. You can choose to walk away now or crawl away in exactly one minute."
"Fock yoo drillhead."
The young men moved towards Riddik, switchblades in hand with one of them releasing a short chain that he swung in his other hand. Riddik turned his combat program on and set it to non-lethal. The left punk stabbed out at Riddik who deflected the knife out to the left side with his right hand, stepping one step forwards and punched his left fist directly into the punk's nose and sending him to the floor screaming in pain. The other punk tried to move to Riddik's left side and swung the chain for Riddik's head. Riddik bent low, folded his arm over his head for protection and took the chain harmlessly across his back before slamming his left elbow into the chest of the other punk. The impact was enough to make the youngster grab his chest in pain and that was the time needed for Riddik to turn and kick his right heel directly on the youngster's knee. The cracking sound told Riddik that the knee was shattered and that this particular punk was out of it. He turned and looked at the other prone punk deciding against an incapacitating kick to the head. Instead he slammed his heel down on the hand that still held the blade, crushing fingers and making him release the blade to the ground.
"It has now been one minute. You may crawl away now."
The punk with the broken nose started rising but got down again when Riddik pointed to the ground.
"I said crawl and I meant crawl. Or do I have to make you?"
The two punks started moving away on hands and knees moaning and sobbing in a very un-gangsta like fashion. Riddik chuckled, that had actually helped a bit on his mood. Now he had to see if their previous target was still alive.
###
The green amniotic fluid blurred his vision but it was still possible to see the room outside his storage tank. Vaso was not happy, if he were in a cloning tank he would have to have died and so failed in his mission whatever that was. In going with standard Serco doctrine he would now have at least one failed check on his papers. Getting three failed checks on his papers meant permanent deletion unless he had been redeemed for his actions. And Asteroth had made it pretty clear that redeeming themselves would not be an option as long as he and Arhem were in the Diplomatic Service. He didn't want to think about it but it was pretty hard not to inside the tank with nothing else to do. He didn't know who had framed him with the pills in boot camp but if he found out he would subject that person to as much pain as Vaso had been receiving himself these last months. The light turned from amber to red and he closed his eyes in anticipation of the sleeping drug that relaxed him for the next learning session.
###
Brix was shaking with cold on the hard metal bed, the single synth wool sheet not enough to let him keep warm. His muscles hurt by this small effort with an intensity that he had thought he could never endure. He wished for this to end, any way that it could. He suspected that he would last maybe two weeks more if he was forced to stay on the xithricite mining detail. Two weeks more of absolute hell. He closed his eyes and tried to rest while his muscles kept spasming.
"Get up scum."
Someone pounded Brix on the legs with a rubber hose adding to the pain that was already present. He considered staying in the bed but knew that the only thing he would gain from it was an activation of the cortical inducer. He opened his eyes and got up to sit on the edge of the metal sheet bed and squinted at his assailant. A quick blow across his face with the rubber tube ensured that he looked down into the floor again.
"Keep you eyes down scum. You have a visitor."
The guard left the small cubicle and slammed the door. Another voice cultured and controlled unlike that of the guard.
"Mr. Brix. I have an offer for you. It will involve you getting out of here and getting a new start."
Brix looked up at the man. Tall, slender but with the light, what little there was, coming from behind his head and thus masking his features.
"Who do I have to kill?"
The man smiled and moved his face slightly forward into the reflected light displaying a very gaunt almost death like visage.
"The question is not who Mr. Brix, it is how many. Be ready on your next watch."
The man left Brix to his misery and walked out to pay the guards. The low pay of the guards ensured that he could get anyone he needed for next to nothing and the barbaric conditions of Xang-Xi ensured that the recruited person wanted to do whatever to get out of it.
###
The evening had been perfect with Utia managing to make Yarina laugh several times, The food had, as always, been fantastic in quality as well as in price and it had taken some considerable argumentation to persuade Yarina not to pay for her half. He paid the exorbitant price and got up to leave.
"Will you follow me home?"
Utia blushed and looked up at her.
"It would be an honour."
He took her arm and escorted her out to the area where the living departments were placed. They found her door and she opened it, stopping in the door. She turned and looked at him standing outside like a lost puppy in uniform.
"Utia, we are not supposed to, but do you want to come in?"
He tried to respond but failed, managing to nod instead.
###
"All pilots stand to. Be ready to engage the strike force in thirty minutes. We have five minutes to sweep the area clean of Tani fighters before our own assault force arrives. The assault force will be three modified Atlas class assault ships. They will NOT show up on the IFF. Pod'ed pilots will be gathered by The Lurkers' medic boat. That is another Atlas; that one will show on IFF. A group of Proms and SVGs will arrive with the Atlas's and escort them in."
Cat smiled inside her SVG at the mention of her old unit. She knew who would be flying the assault ships and the medic ship. She knew that the assault ships would arrive safely and she was confident that they would succeed in their mission. This was going to be a walkover.
###
William finished his cider and disentangled himself from Janice who had fallen asleep against his side on the couch. He chuckled at the slight snoring and got up to dump the trash in the recycling bin. He would just leave her on the couch when he left on combat patrol later. Now he wanted to play with those collector CPU's he had scooped up, see if he could figure out where the hive queen that had made them was nesting. He put a blanket over Janice and walked into his small workroom that could best be described as the stuff hive bot nightmares were made off. Disassembled bot parts were laying all over with schematics on the walls of the most common bot CPU's. And in the middle was the Kannik and Dentek collector CPU's he had found. It shouldn't take more than ten minutes, loads of time to make it to the squadron as well. He started humming an old tune while disassembling the CPU's.
