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Chapter 6:
Empty

Even though Neva knew the breather would protect her from the PK-gas, her skin crawled as they emerged back onto the docks. Latchfield's palpable terror didn't help matters; the man jumped at every flicker of shadow. The weight of her gun felt alien in her hands, and she wondered if she would be able to bring herself to shoot any of the victims, even if it was a choice between her or them.

They aren't all innocent victims. Some were involved in creating the gas in the first place.

The woman who attacked us earlier wasn't a soldier or a scientist, she was a maintenance worker. I can't justify her death so easily.

"You. In front." Jason said to Latchfield, gesturing with his gun. "Don't try anything. You'll get us to the labs quicker, but I'm willing to bet that we could find them on our own if we really had to."

Latchfield looked pained. "You're my only hope of getting off this station."

"Don't forget that."

Latchfield led them down the deserted docks. Neva wondered how many people had been killed or simply died from dehydration, too locked in their nightmares to find even a drink of water. Hundreds at least, if the emptiness of the station was anything to go by, although perhaps it hadn't been a bustling place even before.

"It isn't true, is it?" Latchfield asked, his voice barely above a whisper. "The Cooperative is still strong. Zatvia isn't really gone. It just...it can't be."

His world's falling apart, if it wasn't already. How many shifts did he spend locked up in the quarantine lab, waiting for the next Cooperative supply ship to show up and rescue him?

"It's true," Neva replied bluntly.

"Insurgents? Did insurgents do that? Did they...use asteroids?"

Like the Zats used on Harvest? She bit her lower lip to keep angry words from spilling. "Talking is only going to attract unwanted attention," she said instead, and he shut his mouth with an audible snap.

Silence enveloped them, so deep that it set Neva's nerves on edge. A distant clang made both her and Latchfield jump, and Jason winced. "What was that?" Neva asked.

"No telling." There came a distant scream, and Jason lifted his gun uneasily.

Goddess. "Someone's in trouble."

"Hurrying is the best thing we can do for them right now."

"The labs are on level 4, section 5," Latchfield said, and led them into a dimly-lit hallway.

"What happened to the lights?" Neva asked.

Latchfield shrugged. "I don't know. Some systems switched over to emergency power a few shifts ago. If there's anyone up in Control, punching buttons...well, at least they haven't vented us all into space yet."

Neva shivered. "Wonderful." As if she needed something more to worry about.

Jason came to a sudden halt, putting out his hand to stop her as well. "There's someone up ahead," he murmured. "Listen."

Neva strained to catch any whisper of sound. From far off she heard more banging, but it was muffled by distance. The soft hiss of the air vents seemed unnaturally loud, as did her own rushing heartbeat. Then she heard what had caught Jason's attention--the hitch of broken, painful breaths, as of someone in intense pain.

"Let's go another way," Latchfield whispered, backing up and almost stepping on Neva's foot.

"No. Someone needs help." Neva pushed him aside and hurried in the direction of the sounds.

A large shape was tucked into a recessed doorway, its knees drawn against its chest, its hands held limply in front of it. "Hello?" Neva said cautiously. "Are you all right?"

Of course they aren't all right. They're sucking down PK-gas and hallucinating. How could anyone be all right in those circumstances?

Then shape stirred, lifting its head. The dim light touched short gray hair, a craggy nose, and blue eyes rimmed in red. With a gasp, Neva dropped down by him, setting aside her gun. "Marcus?"

Marcus didn't even look at her. His pupils were constricted to pinpricks, his breathing uneven and erratic. Silently praying he didn't turn violent, she carefully touched his wrist to check the pulse.

"I killed her," he said.

Neva's heart leapt into her mouth, but she managed to keep her voice calm. "Who did you kill, Marcus?" Goddess, please let that be part of the hallucination and not something real.

He didn't seem to hear the question. "I killed her. That's why I cut off my hands." He held up his hands, turning them back and forth slowly, as if examining them. "There's so much blood, but at least I can't hurt anyone again."

"Marcus, it's Neva. Listen to me. None of this is real." Neva reached out and took his hand, squeezing his fingers hard. "Feel that? Your hands are still there. You have to believe me, Marcus."

"He's lost in his mind," Latchfield said. "He can't hear you, or if he does, he'll just perceive whatever words his mind tells him to. You can't reach him, so please, let's just hurry and get to the labs."

"Shut up," Neva snarled. "I'm not leaving him here like this." She set down the small kit she carried slung over one shoulder and began to hunt through it for the extra breathers she'd stuffed in it before they left the ship.

"As much as I hate to agree with this piece of offal, I think he's right," Jason said, favoring Latchfield with a dark look, as if to make certain the Zat didn't get the idea that Jason had any charitable feelings towards him. "There's nothing we can do for Marcus now except give him the breather and complete our mission."

"If we take him to the labs--"

"And if he turns violent before we get there? It will take hours for the gas to wear off, even with the breath. There's no knowing what he might do before them," Jason said bluntly. "I don't want to be responsible for shooting him to save one of us. Do you?"

"No." It went against every instinct to just leave Marcus there in distress, but her frantically racing mind came up with no alternatives.

"I don't like it, either." Jason shook his head. "But if we don't complete the mission, then everyone will die. Even if they don't kill each other, they'll eventually dehydrate or starve. We have to leave him."

Neva nodded. She carefully slipped the breather over Marcus' head and settled it on his face. He didn't seem to even notice she was there. "We'll be back for you, Marcus. It's going to be all right."

That at least reached him. Marcus shook his head slowly, staring off into the distance. "No. No. Nothing's all right. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry."

"Come on," Latchfield said fearfully.

Neva let go of Marcus and followed Jason and Latchfield down the corridor. A last look back over her shoulders showed Marcus slowly curling into a ball, his whole body wracked by shudders.

*   *   *

*don't leave me alone, don't leave me alone, don't LEAVE ME ALONE!*

The Thing in the Dark, that had been called Rat, snarled and shook his head, trying to dislodge the scream, to deny it. It wanted to annihilate him, to suck him down into black emptiness and oblivion, the last firing of a synapse before the final darkness.

He was closer now, spiraling inward towards the center of the maelstrom; so close that he could almost taste her mind. He collected nightmares as he went, armoring himself to fight her, to keep himself from slipping away into the dark before he could silence her screams.

A man lay on the floor ahead, gasping frantically. Rat slid into his vision and saw a gaping hole in the station's skin that sucked away all the air. Nothing that could help him, so he kept going, stepping over the twitching man. The man tried to grab his ankle, begging for aid, so Rat kicked him in the face. Pain exploded in his own nose; he staggered back, then saw that the man had slipped into unconsciousness. The hole in the station vanished.

A waste of time. Rat snarled and kept going.

*   *   *

Neva found the tranq gun when she tripped over it.

The hallway was dark enough that they had taken out their small flashlights to help them see where they were going. The beams were intense but narrow, and left far too much of the corridor to the imagination. Fortunately, they hadn't run across signs of anyone else--until her foot caught on something unseen in the dark, and sent her sprawling to the floor.

Jason spun, shining his light into her face. "Neva? Are you all right?"

"I'm fine." She put up her hand to shield her eyes, and he quickly directed the light away, leaving her blinking away the afterimage. "I fell over something."

The light touched the gleaming barrel. Jason recognized it first and swore softly in his native language.

The tranq gun. Rat was carrying it.

Neva shone her light around frantically, certain that she would see Rat's broken form lying nearby. Her heart caught when she spotted a crumpled shape farther down the corridor, but it was too small to be a body. Jason went to it, nudged it cautiously with his gun, then bent down and picked it up.

"That's Rat's coat," Neva said, feeling a chill run down her spine.

"There's no damage, or blood on it," Jason said, turning it back and forth. His light swept the floor, revealing a trail of other articles. "And that would be his shirt, his pants, and his shoes. Apparently our captain has decided the natural look is appropriate for violent hallucinations this season."

"He'll need this then," Neva said, and took the coat from Jason. It was too bulky to carry, so she slipped it on. It was far too long on her of course, and heavier against her shoulders than she had expected. It smelled like him, though, and she took a deep breath, drawing what comfort she could from it. "Latchfield. You never said what the gas would do to a Project Zero inductee."

Latchfield stood with his back to the wall, glancing up and down the corridor and fidgeting with impatience. When Neva spoke, however, he gave her a worried look. "I don't know. Project Zero was just a crazy rumor I heard once. You obviously know more about it than I do." He sounded a bit miffed, as if it injured his professional pride. "Come on. We don't have time to stand around playing dress-up."

Jason pointed his gun at Latchfield's head with a disturbing casualness. "You seem to have forgotten that you aren't the one giving orders here."

Latchfield blanched, but his eyes narrowed. "Just who are you people, anyway?"

"No one you want to get mad," Neva answered, grabbing him by the shoulder and shoving him further down the corridor. "Now go!"

Their guide didn't say anything, but gave them a dark look over his shoulder. Soon they came to a bank of lifts. At least the machinery was still operating, Neva thought. Climbing emergency access ladders was not her idea of fun, let alone doing it on a station full of people in the grip of violent hallucinations.

After reaching level 4, they only went a short distance before turning a corner. Latchfield gestured to the doors at the opposite end. "Those are the doors to the lab. They're still sealed."

The corridor outside the lab looked as though it had been painted with blood, and Neva was glad for the dry, filtered air of the breather. Blood covered the floor, and made her boots stick unpleasantly. Streaks on the metal showed where people had clawed at the doors with their fingernails. The body of a man lay against one wall; someone had sliced him open and dragged his guts out onto the floor. Neva swung her light onto the body, and saw that he'd been there long enough for his eyes to collapse. There were wounds on his throat, the ragged edges of which showed teeth marks.

Goddess. "Did this happen before or after you sealed yourself inside?" she asked, a little surprised to hear how steady her voice was.

"I didn't have a choice," Latchfield said defensively. "I didn't know how long it would take for help to come. I couldn't take the chance that I'd run out of supplies. They should have left, instead of staying where they were, hemmed in when the gas took full effect."

She stepped away from the body. "My people believe that whatever you send out comes back to you three times over."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Jason used his gun to gesture towards the door. "Just get the cursed door open."

Latchfield went to the door and laid his hand on a panel beside the wall. It came to life, glowing softly at his touch. He spoke a series of code words, followed by a string of numbers, and Neva guessed that voice recognition was a part of the security on the section. The door pinged softly, and slid open.

Jason entered first, then Latchfield, then Neva. The section was meant to contain any hazards that escaped inside the lab, so the short corridor beyond the door acted as a sort of airlock. The second door had even more security on it than the first, but soon enough they were through.

Latchfield pulled off his breather. "It's clean in here. Separate filters, no air exchange with the rest of the station."

Neva stripped off her own breather and sucked in a deep lung-full of air. It had the sterile smell she associated with surgeries and morgues, and the familiarity helped her feel a bit more grounded. We'll get through this. Somehow. We have to.

The way Jason tugged off his breather told Neva he was just as grateful to get the cursed thing away from his face as she was. "All right," he started. "We need to try and find some sort of sedative gas that we can hook in to the air--"

He stopped, and his gun twitched up, just a fraction too slow. Neva felt Latchfield's hand close around her upper arm at the same moment something sharp and cold pricked the side of her neck.

"All right," he said, his voice shaking slightly. "Any false moves, and I will inject this straight into her jugular. Don't think I won't."

It's a syringe of some sort. He must have grabbed it off the counter. It could be harmless, an empty threat.

Or it could be a sedative, or a tissue preservative, or some horrible chemical cocktail they cooked up to kill people with.

Jason stood frozen, his gun at half-mast. "All right. Fine. Don't do anything you'll regret. Remember, we're your only ticket off this station."

Latchfield's hand tightened convulsively on Neva's arm; without the protection of Rat's coat, she would have had bruises. "I want some answers. I thought you might have been from Command, undercover for some reason, or at least an authorized trader. You've got a Project Zero inductee on your ship, and from what I've heard that can't happen unless you're very, very high up. But you don't act right. You have no respect for me, for the important work I've performed here on behalf of the Cooperative. You say there isn't a Cooperative any more, you threaten me...so you're going to tell me, right now, who the hell you people are."

Neva met Jason's eyes. He wasn't going to risk shooting Latchfield with her under a needle of Goddess-knew-what. Which left her to act.

She kicked sideways, hard. The strike was good; she caught his shin with the heavy sole of her boot, cracking across the bone. Latchfield shrieked and dropped both hands instinctively to protect his legs; the moment the needle was clear of Neva's neck, Jason fired.

Latchfield screamed again, clutching now at his ankle. Neva saw that his boot was melted into his skin.

She dropped to her knees by him, grabbed his hair, and jerked his head back. "You want to know who we are?" she demanded. "We're pirates. We're pirates on a mission, and our crewmates are wandering around crazy because of you, which really, really pisses me off."

"Find something to tie him up with," Jason said. "I'll watch him while you look."

"Y-you can't do this," Latchfield said through the tears streaking his face. "You can't do this to me."

"We can do whatever we want to you," Jason replied mildly. "Including kill you now that you've gotten us into the lab."

The Zat doctor fell silent as he realized his usefulness had come to an end. Neva found a cabinet marked Restraints, which gave her a shudder of revulsion. Not something you'd normally find in a lab. I guess they needed them for the "test subjects."

She jerked the restraints a bit tighter than necessary around Latchfield's wrists and ankles, including the injured one. He stared at her accusingly as she worked, and she felt a rush of rage. How many innocent people have suffered because of what he's done? How many did he torture himself in this very lab? And he won't even admit that he's done anything wrong.

Giving a last, vicious tug on the restraints, she stood up and wiped her hands on her pants. "Come on," she said to Jason. "Let's start looking"

*   *   *

Fiona stared at the gun in her hand. Mary's fingers, nothing more than bones held together by dried tendons and leathery strips of skin, drifted along the barrel in a parody of a lover's caress. The air stank of rot, but beneath it was the sweet smell of heather, as if they sat together in their little cottage in the hills once again.

"Fight for me," Mary whispered in her ear. "‘Strong and faithful,' isn't that the MacLachlan motto? Make the clan proud, Fiona. Make me proud. Kill the Zats. And then...then we can be together again."

Fiona swallowed convulsively against the dryness in her throat. Her hands shook, but she knew what she had to do. "Yes. Kill the Zats first. I promise you, Mary, I won't be letting you down this time. I won't."

"I know you won't," Mary said. Her dead lips pressed briefly against Fiona's, tasting of salt and blood. The curve of white bone gleamed through her cheek, so Fiona closed her eyes, not wanting to see. When she opened them again, Mary was gone.

Gone...but not far. Surely Mary's spirit was watching nearby, making certain that Fiona upheld her part of the bargain.

"I won't be failing you, Mary," Fiona whispered as she staggered to her feet. She held her gun close, pressed her lips against the barrel. "I'll kill all the bastards, every stinking one of them. And then I'll be joining you."

As Mary's happy laughter echoed down the corridor behind her, Fiona stumbled away, looking for enemies.

*   *   *

Neva and Jason ransacked the lab with cold efficiency. Most of the chemicals used in weapons development were kept neatly ordered, which made their job far easier. Neva went from row to row, reading labels. She didn't recognize a great many of the compounds; of those she did, most had effects she didn't want to contemplate. PK-gas was one of the milder substances, comparatively speaking, and as she felt a slow, boiling anger filling her veins, the idea of going back and punching Latchfield in the head a few times became more and more tempting.

At first, she worried that they wouldn't be able to find anything safe enough to introduce into the air supply. Luck was with them, however, and eventually she reached out and began to loosen one of the canisters from its mounting. "This ought to do it," she said. The metal was cold against her hands, and the freed canister was heavy, making her hope they didn't have to go far to find life support. "The concentration is important, but at worst we'll make everyone too drowsy to do anything for a couple of hours until the PK-gas wears off."

Jason had gone to one of the monitors while Neva searched. Peering over his shoulder, she saw that he'd managed to call up a schematic of the station. "Good," he said. He tapped a spot on the screen, and it obligingly zoomed in. "I think I've found the point where the PK-gas must be getting into the system. We'll disable that canister, and replace it with the sedative."

"What about Latchfield?"

"We leave him restrained here. He'll be safe enough with the doors closed."

Although Neva had no sympathy for the Zat, she felt compelled to speak up. "If something happens to us, he'll die."

Jason shrugged. "He should have thought of that before he threatened you. Come on. The sooner we get this done, the sooner we get the rest of the crew back."

*   *   *

Alouette pressed herself into the recess by the emergency access. Her heart pounded madly, and she curled into a ball, pressing her face into her knees. Maybe if she closed her eyes and was very, very still, he wouldn't realize she was there. He'd pass by, not notice her, not drag her out of the line.

It occurred to her belatedly that there was no line of slaves being herded to the mines on Waga Chun. She had already been noticed and taken aside. She was in a small room adjacent to his office, waiting, wondering what her fate would be. Maybe they knew she was a navigator. Maybe the Zats wanted to interrogate her, although for what she couldn't imagine. Maybe...

Every muscle in her body locked as footsteps sounded down the corridor. Don't see me, don't see me, please keep going, please...

"Hello, there, pretty," his voice came, and she stifled a whimper of despair. "Have you been waiting on me? Don't fret--I've brought friends."

The hallway echoed with masculine laughter. Alouette curled in on herself more tightly. "Help me," she shouted. "Help me!"

*   *   *

Neva and Jason made their way cautiously along the corridor. They were headed for life support, which was deep within the interior of the station, where it would be safe from most minor dangers such as collisions with ships or small meteors. Neva's arms ached from the weight of the canister, but as Jason was the better fighter, it made more sense for him to remain unencumbered in case they ran into trouble. The breather made matters worse; Neva felt as though she were suffocating even as she panted with exertion.

So far, they had been lucky, but Neva didn't count on that luck lasting for long. Even if the station had been violently depopulated, it seemed too much to hope that they'd make it all the way to their destination without encountering any of the mad victims wandering the corridors.

As if in answer to her thought, a moan sounded from ahead. Jason stiffened, and signaled for her to hang back. Moving cautiously, he swung his flashlight in an arc, and picked out a huddled form.

"Alouette!" Neva exclaimed. She started to put down the canister, intending to make certain her friend hadn't been hurt, when Alouette suddenly let out a blood-curdling cry.

"Help me! Help me!"

The navigator's small body convulsed, her right hand striking the wall with a painful thump. For an instant, she thrashed wildly on the floor, and Neva caught a glimpse of the whites of her eyes, the rest rolled back into her head.

"She's having a seizure!" Neva shouted, and dropped the canister to run to Alouette. "Hex it, I don't have anything to treat her!"

But even as Neva reached her side, Alouette stilled. Her eyes closed--then opened, the look in them perfectly clear. With a single, easy movement, she rose to her feet, surveying her surroundings with a rather put-upon expression.

"What is this?" she asked. She spoke in an oddly nasal voice; her tone, her accent, even the way she held herself, were utterly different from the Alouette that Neva knew. "Where is my hat? My cane? My sunglasses?" She scowled at Neva. "My rum?"

Neva blinked, wondering if this was some new phase of the hallucinatory gas. "Your what?"

"My hot-pepper rum!" Alouette sighed and waved her hand in a gesture of dismissal. "Never mind. I've been in worse places."

Jason exchanged a glance with Neva, hefting the tranq gun. Neva shook her head slightly; no sense in drugging their crewmate so long as she wasn't dangerous to them or herself. "Alouette? Do you know where you are?"

Alouette turned a glare on her. "Alouette! Alouette is my horse! I am Baron Samedi!"

"What is she talking about?" Jason asked in a low voice.

Neva shook her head, baffled. "I have no idea."

Alouette, or Baron Samedi, or whoever she was at the moment, shook her head. "My horse doesn't talk about serving the spirits? Bah. You tell her, beautiful woman, to talk to you. You know who is my wife, yes?"

Something here doesn't make sense. Not just the words, but the way Alouette was acting. She didn't seem like a woman in the throes of a violent hallucination, even though she had clearly been so when they'd come upon her. Hallucinogens change the person's perceptions, not their base personality. Everything about Alouette has altered, though, even her body language. "I'm sorry, I don't think so," Neva replied carefully, hoping to play along. "What is her name?"

"My wife is the beautiful woman Maman Brigitte. You call her Brigid."

"Brigid is one of the names of the Goddess."

Alouette grinned, her teeth gleaming white in her dark face. "Yes. Long time ago, she come across the waters. Couldn't find a real man to fuck in her home, so she come to Baron Samedi." Alouette's hips thrust out suggestively.

Neva stared; she'd never heard Alouette utter any profanity before. "Um..."

"You're a spirit," Jason said abruptly.

"Haven't I said that already?" Alouette--the Baron--said haughtily. "Well, come, come. Nothing will get done standing here. I'll show you where to go." And with that, she--he--turned and strode off down the corridor, singing a bawdy tune.

Neva glanced at Jason, who shrugged. "He's going in the right direction, at least."

"A spirit?"

"Or a coping mechanism of Alouette's mind. I don't see that it makes any difference at the moment."

Neva hefted the canister in her aching arms. "All right. It's no stranger than anything else this trip."

*   *   *

The Baron led Neva and Jason directly to life support. They saw no one else on the way there, although the signs of violence were everywhere in the form of bloodstains, vomit, or puddles of urine. Normally, life support would be under secure locks, but whoever had sabotaged it initially had done their work for them, and the doors stood open. Neva supposed they were lucky no one else had stumbled inside and destroyed something vital.

The huge fans caused a constant rumble that Neva felt in her bones. She had occasionally seen the inner workings of the Exile's life support, but she'd never had cause to be near a system large enough to allow hundreds of people survive in space. Doors that should have been locked stood open, and the Baron led the way into the first of a series of enormous rooms filled with glittering banks of controls. A body in an advanced state of decay lay near the controls, and Neva guessed that the initial saboteur had killed the worker to gain access to the area.

"We need to go further," Jason said. "This is part of the filtration system--the PK-gas will have to have been introduced near the main outflow, after the filters."

Although Jason and Neva made their way cautiously through the rooms, the Baron didn't seem terribly worried about ambush, and kept singing as they went. Well, at least one of us isn't worried.

"Here!" called Jason from the doorway several rooms down. Hoping to put the canister down soon, Neva hurried to join him.

The roar of air was almost deafening; as soon as she entered, Neva saw why. A panel opening into the outflow had been pulled off and flung on the floor. A tangle of wires had been used to strap a canister into place and link it to the controls.

"I think I can swap the PK-gas and the sedative," Jason said, shouting to be heard over the rush of air. "You take the tranq gun and stand guard!"

Neva nodded and gratefully traded the canister for the much-lighter gun. Her arms hurt when she bent her elbows, and she winced, knowing that she would be lucky to be able to lift them above her waist for the next few shifts. She turned to look for her other companion, and spotted the Baron standing near the door. As she came near, he gestured to a console near the door. "Better take cover, beautiful woman, if you don't want to join me beneath the waters."

She opened her mouth to ask what he meant, when a shot came through the door, melting the carpet between them.

"Hex it!" Neva shouted, and tackled her companion, bringing them both to the floor behind the console. Ignoring protests of wounded dignity, she twisted around and yelled over her shoulder. "Jason! We're under fire!"

"Then cover me!" he shouted back. His legs hung out of the open panel, while the rest of him was buried the guts of the air circulator.

Another shot came, this time accompanied by a familiar voice. "Damn your eyes! Come out and face me, you Zatvian cowards! I'll be sending you to hell where you belong!"

Neva risked a quick peek out the door, and what she saw made her heart sink. Fiona, looking utterly deranged, staggered in their direction, firing wildly as she went. Her red hair was stuck to her face, and her blue eyes gleamed madly, their pupils contracted to mere pinpricks.

"Fiona! It's us!" Neva shouted. "Your friends!"

If she was hoping to get a rational reaction out of the first mate, she was disappointed. A flurry of shots forced her to jerk back to cover. Jason shouted and swore when one plastered the wall dangerously close to him.

"Neva! What are you doing? Shoot her!" he yelled.

Neva swallowed and readied the tranq gun. Taking a deep breath, she leaned around the console and squeezed off a shot. The dart flew out the door and clattered harmlessly on the floor, nowhere near Fiona.

Fiona's next shot hit the other side of the console, sending up curls of smoke. The Baron watched with a sort of detached curiosity; Neva supposed that if one were a spirit, there wasn't much need to get excited about being shot at. "That madwoman is going to kill your horse," she snapped, hoping to get a more helpful reaction.

"What are you waiting for, then? You should shoot her."

"I'm trying!" Silently cursing both of her companions, Neva leaned out and risked another shot. Fiona was much closer, heart-stoppingly so, but the second dart missed as badly as the first. The only thing it served to do was catch Fiona's attention.

"I'm seeing you, you bloody bastards!" she shouted, heading for the console. "I'm going to be killing you and cutting out your hearts! Fortis et fidus!"

At least she wasn't threatening Jason anymore, Neva thought resignedly. "Fiona, curse it, it's me, Neva! There aren't any Zats here! Whatever you're seeing, it isn't real!"

"No! You see me, Mary? I'm not letting them trick me. I--"

Hoping to take advantage of Fiona's rant, Neva ducked around the console and shot her point-blank with the tranq gun. Fiona fired at the same instant; Neva felt heat on one side of her face and smelled scorched hair.

Fiona staggered back, her gun clattering on the floor. Her hands went to her belly, where the dart pinned her shirt to her abdomen. "You've killed me," she whispered.

"Fiona, no." Neva hesitated, not certain how long she had before the tranq took effect, and not willing to risk drawing too close. "It's not real, it's just an illusion. It--"

Fiona slumped to the ground, her head hitting the floor with a resounding thump.

Neva winced, and dropped down by her, yanking out the dart. Fiona's pulse was strong under her fingers, and she let out a sigh of relief. "All right. So long as no one else wanders up, we should be okay."

There came a clang as a canister hit the floor behind her. Jason slithered out of the access. "It's done. The PK-gas is out, and the sedative is in. Give it a couple of hours, and we'll remove the sedative and let untainted air through. People should start waking up sane. Hopefully."

"One last thing."

Neva turned and found herself staring into a pair of dark eyes. The Baron gave her a smile, showing off white, even teeth. "You tell my horse, that man she fears? I dug his grave. You tell her that."

"I will."

Alouette's eyes closed, and her head tipped back. She took a deep breath...and slowly slumped to the floor as the sedative took effect.

"Well," Jason said, looking down at their unconscious crewmates, "I guess now we wait."

*   *   *

Almost there. Almost there. I'm coming to get you, and I'm almost there.

Military logos writhed on the walls as Rat passed them, and he hissed in warning. They thought they were going to catch him, but they should have known better. He'd escaped them before, after all.

As he drew closer to the source of the silent screaming, the number of dead bodies increased. Most of them had died violently, innards smashed, necks broken, bits torn away as if some maddened beast had rampaged down the hall. It had robbed him of their dreams, just when he needed them most, and it made him angry.

Clever, clever, to do this. But I'm going to get you anyway. And then you'll finally be quiet, and I won't feel the edge of the void at my fingertips, sucking me down...

He pulled his mind away from that trap. He had to hold to himself, or else she'd drag him down and destroy him.

Even so, he could use her as a guide. The floor sloped under him, everything falling into the void, and he followed it to the door.

The door was shut. He stared at it for a long time; it seemed that the symbol on it should mean something to him, but he couldn't think what. It made him angry, and he snarled. He was the Thing in the Dark; details like this didn't matter. Nothing could stop him, and everything should fear him.

The door slid open onto darkness. For an instant, he thought there was no walls, no floor, nothing at all but the void. That was her emptiness, though, and he armored himself against it. He had wings, didn't he, and legs that clung, and weapons to negotiate the blackness. The Thing in the Dark didn't fear the night, after all.

The floor created itself beneath his feet. Slowly, he became aware that there was a light, faint but enough to make out shapes. Something huddled in one corner, and he paced closer. He had managed to sneak up; she wasn't aware of him, he could strike first...

Her head snapped up, and she flooded into him.

*Empty, empty, nothing, so alone, so alone, please please please please...*

No! He jerked back, snarling, but it was too late, he was ensnared. No, don't! Stop!

*I hear you, hear you (hope/love) please please talk to me, fill the empty space*

No! He tried to draw back, but she was on him. Her face was soft, round, a young woman barely out of childhood. But something had ravaged her; black patches spread like dead veins over her cheeks, and the scent of infection rode her breath. Blood trickled from her nose.

"Please," she whispered into his face. Her grip was weak, but he couldn't pull away. He was drowning in the emptiness inside her. "Please, don't leave me. Talk to me. In my head. Talk..."

No, let me go, I don't like this, don't like it, it hurts, stop, stop, STOP!

*yes, talk to me, stay with me, thank you, thank you, thank you*

His limbs felt heavy. They were slipping to the floor together, her hands still clutching his arms, and in a distant part of his mind he wondered what had happened, where his control of the situation had gone. He felt strange, as though something had gone out of him. Rat. My name is Rat.

What's happening to me?

*don't leave me* Her eyes were glazed, blank. Dying. Blood pooled in their corners, spilled down like crimson tears.

I won't.

*thank you* She blinked slowly. *where are you?*

I'm here.

Everything was going dark. He felt her grip loosen, and reached out, touching her fingers.

And then, there was nothing.

*   *   *

Rat opened his eyes. His head ached horribly, and his skin prickled with cold. He levered himself up and spat, although it did nothing to relieve the rusty taste in his mouth.

"Gods," he mumbled. What had happened? He remembered...coming onto the station...and then...

Oh hell.

The Fury.

She lay beside him, her eyes open and staring. Dried blood drew lines from her nostrils and eyes, but he knew that he hadn't killed her. From the rot darkening her cheeks, that process had already been well underway. Although I was probably the last straw. Damn it. Damn me.

She was sane. Whatever happened to me...to us all...it didn't affect her. When she asked me to talk into her mind, when she begged...she knew what she was asking.

She just wanted someone to stop the silence. And...there was only one voice, not two, like there should have been. One of them had already died.

Very gently, he reached out and closed her eyes.

Com cut on, startling him. Neva's voice sounded, gentle and reassuring. "Attention all personnel. You have been subjected to a hallucinogenic gas. Whatever you have experienced, be assured that it was not real. If you are in need of medical attention, please report to the dock area in front of berth 24-A. If you are able to render assistance, please bring those too injured to walk to the dock area in front of berth 24-A. This message is on auto-repeat."

Neva. He closed his eyes, weak with relief. Whatever happened here, at least she's all right.

And the rest of the crew?

His whole body hurt, and shivers pebbled his bare skin. Limping, he made his way down the corridor, past those who had been destroyed by the Fury in her first pain, before she was too far gone to do more. He didn't allow himself to think about anything outside of putting one foot in front of the other, and finding the quickest way back to the docks. The air stank of death, and he didn't see anyone else alive.

The gathering in front of the Exile's berth was distressingly small, but at least that made it easy to pick out the members of his crew. Rat's heart lifted slightly. They were all on their feet, which meant none of them had been seriously injured. Goddess. We were lucky.

The whispers got louder as he drew closer, banging around in his abused head, and he took a deep breath and tried to ignore the confusion and pain and fear. Neva was tending a young man with a wicked-looking gash in his head, and Rat guiltily remembered hitting him with a length of pipe.

Although there were a thousand other things he ought to be doing, he made for Neva first, just to reassure himself that she was all right. She glanced up and nodded at him, and he saw that the hair on one side of her face was singed, as if from a weapons discharge. Oh damn. That was close.

Juanita and Marcus were loitering around the perimeter, both armed, presumably in case someone turned violent. Marcus looked horrible, with dark circles under his eyes, and he kept checking his hands, as if he expected them to have vanished. Juanita seemed her normal self, however.

"Nice butt, captain," she called as he limped past.

"Hmph," Marcus said, rousing a little bit. "Get your eyes back in your head, woman."

"Why should I? No harm in looking, I always say."

"You would."

Jason intercepted him. "I believe these are yours, captain."

Rat took the long black coat, and--thank the Goddess--a pair of pants. "Thanks. Is everyone all right?"

"More or less. A few bumps and bruises. Fiona tried to kill us, but no harm done. I can give you a full report now, if you'd like."

Rat hauled the pants up over his hips. "Tell me while we walk." He glanced at Neva. "If all the critical cases are taken care of, I've got something for you to take a look at."

"Just let me finish this up."

"Marcus?"

Marcus looked up warily. "Yes?"

"I need you to identify a body."

*   *   *

"It isn't her."

*not Genevieve, thank you God, still some hope but she was someone's little girl wasn't she (sorrow)*

Rat let out a breath he didn't realize he'd been holding. The idea that their search might have ended so soon, and so tragically, had haunted him from the moment he'd opened his eyes and realized exactly who--what--the girl was. At least there's still hope.

Neva knelt by the Fury, carefully examining the body that lay sprawled like a broken doll. "There are signs of massive infection." She leaned over and sniffed. "Gangrene. She's rotting from the inside out. Any idea what happened to her, Rat?"

"No." He rubbed his face tiredly, wishing he could forget. "I just know that she was hurting. And lonely. I only heard one voice from her, not two."

Neva sat back on her heels and met his eyes. "Did you hear the symbiote or the girl?"

"I don't know."

Marcus stirred. "How could you not know? You either heard a human being or a monster! Even you ought to be able to tell the fucking difference!"

"Stand down, mister," Fiona said sharply. She leaned wearily against the wall, but her blue eyes were hard and alert.

"You're tired, not being fair to the Rat-man," Juanita added, putting a hand to Marcus' arm. After a long moment, he nodded jerkily.

"Sorry, captain."

Neva stood up and absently stripped off the protective gloves she'd been wearing while examining the corpse. "I want to take her back to the Exile and do a full autopsy."

Rat nodded. "Do it. Marcus, help Neva carry the body, then report back to me. The rest of you...we're going to strip this station of everything we can reasonably carry, starting with the weapons labs."

"And what are we going to be doing with it, captain?" Fiona asked.

He gave her a grin with no humor in it. "We're pirates--what do you think we're going to do? We've got a lot of space to cover yet, and we're going to need things to sell and barter. Strip anything that fits the bill, except what the people left on the station might need to get by."

"Even though they're Zats?"

"Even though they're Zats. As for the weapons, the bad ones, we'll dump them in hyperspace. I might not sell them, but I'm not leaving them here for anyone else, either. Jason, get into the lab computers, download what you can, then wipe the data."

"Aye captain."

Fiona pushed herself off the wall. "All right, people, you were hearing the man. Let's move."

*   *   *

Neva stood on the docks, as Marcus and Juanita passed by carrying the last of the scavenged items to stow on board. The air no longer smelled quite so sharply of death; most of the nearby bodies had been removed to the station's morgue. As for the rest...it would take a while to find them all.

Most of the survivors stood in a cluster nearby, looking stunned and bewildered. The Exile's crew had only been under the influence of the gas for a few hours; these people had been lost in nightmares for over a week. They needed psychological help, which she felt sure they wouldn't have gotten even if the Cooperative had still been around. The Zats had looked down on mental problems; depressed or disturbed people weren't part of the Cooperative's utopian self-image.

Neva couldn't help with that, but she could, and had, treated the wounds on their bodies. One or two of her patients had worn the uniforms of Zatvian soldiers, and she'd tried not to wonder if they had approved of the development of weapons like the PK-gas, or if they'd looked the other way in return for a steady paycheck.

Her heart heavy, she turned towards the boarding tube, when a familiar voice called out. "Stop! You said you'd take me with you!"

She turned in surprise and saw Latchfield limping down the docks towards her. Someone must have released him when they were raiding the weapons lab. His round face shone with sweat, and his feet slapped loudly on the scuffed decking. The other stationers had come alert, staring at him or at Neva, probably wondering what was up since Rat had categorically refused to let any of them aboard the ship.

"We don't have the space, and they have what they need to stay here," he'd said with a shrug. "Plus there are ships at dock, although some of them are probably damaged. They have options."

Now Neva stepped between the tube and Latchfield. "I don't remember offering to take you anywhere," she told him coldly.

He stopped, his eyes widening. "That was our agreement! I'd take you to the lab, and you'd take me on your ship!"

Contempt touched her. "There was no deal, Latchfield. Even if you hadn't threatened me, we wouldn't take the likes of you with us. Neither Jason nor I ever promised anything to you, unless it was when you were threatening to jab a needle into my neck."

The sound of someone in the boarding tube came from behind her. A moment later, Marcus appeared by her side. "Trouble?" he growled.

"None at all." She glanced at the listening crowd. "Marcus, let me introduce you to Dr. Evan Latchfield. He was the one in charge of developing the PK-gas."

A murmur ran through the crowd. Latchfield paled sharply. "N-no. You can't! You can't leave me here!"

"Goodbye, doctor," Neva said, and turned her back on him to walk to the boarding tube.

"Stay away!" she heard him shout from behind her. "I said stay back! I was only trying to help people!"

The airlock cut off the sound of his screams.

Please read my note on vodou.