Page 7 of Willow and the Wraith

The oppressive silence was broken only by the occasional creak of metal settling or the distant wheeze of the laboring life support system. As he approached a junction in the corridor, a faint shimmer in the air caught his eye and he heard an almost imperceptible hum. He stopped and studied the area for a moment, then picked up a tangled remnant of wire from the floor and tossed it forward. The wire sizzled and disintegrated in mid-air.

Fuck. An energy barrier. This was no standard security measure for an abandoned station.

He pulled out a small electromagnetic device, calibrated it, and aimed it at the barrier. A pulse of energy shot out, temporarily disrupting the field, and he slipped through, the barrier snapping back into place behind him. Breaking the field was a calculated risk - the interruption had lasted only seconds, but it could have been noticed - and he paused to listen for any sign of an alarm.

When the silence remained unbroken, he continued his journey towards the center of the station. As he turned down another corridor, he encountered a series of laser grids, the dust floating in the air revealing the red beams crisscrossing the passage. Annoying, but not much of a deterrent. He studied the timing for a few minutes, then slipped through them, contorting his body with practiced ease as he navigated the deadly web.

At the far end of the hallway, a heavy blast door blocked his path. That in itself was not unusual, but the control panel next to the door was unusually complex - military-grade and far beyond the usual standard on this type of station. He pulled out another device, this one a compact hacking tool, and connected it to the panel.

As the tool cycled, he permitted himself a small smile of satisfaction. The presence of these advanced security measures confirmed the information he’d uncovered. He’d been hired to track down a ring of slavers trafficking in human females, and although his first lead had died before Wraith caught up with him, he’d been able to retrieve a data drive from the slaver’s ship. That data had led him down a circuitous route to this station and what he hoped was a key hub in the slavers’ operations.

The door slid open with a hydraulic hiss to reveal an ordinary lift. After a careful examination, he stepped inside, then paused to study the options. Most stations followed a fairly standardized pattern which meant the control room should be at the top of the station. Bracing himself against the walls in case of a trap, he chose the top floor.

His caution was unnecessary. The lift rose jerkily but uneventfully up the shaft, and he shook his head. Careless of whoever had installed the other security measures to assume that no further precautions were necessary. He would have arranged for the floor to drop out, or perhaps sent a deadly gas through the air vent…

He amused himself by plotting other possible traps until the elevator jerked to a halt and the doors opened. Keeping his body pressed against the side wall, he did a quick survey of the control room beyond.

The pristine area was a stark contrast to the dilapidated corridors he’d traversed previously. The space wasn’t large, but state-of-the-art equipment lined one wall while a small but luxurious seating area occupied the center of the room. Everything he saw confirmed his suspicions - this wasn’t just an ordinary hideout, but a well-funded, sophisticated operation.

He glided silently into the room, his senses on high alert. There was no sign of life, but the indications of recent occupation were everywhere. Two half-empty glasses of wine were abandoned on the low table in front of the sofa, a chair had been pushed back haphazardly, as if its occupant had left in a hurry, and a datapad with a cracked screen was half-hidden on the floor beneath the desk.

Fuck. His quarry had fled. How could they have known he was coming?

He tried the central console, but the system was unresponsive and he caught the acrid smell of burned electronics. Frowning, he tried the datapad instead. The fractured display flickered to life momentarily, revealing a portion of a message:

“… compromised. Leave immediately. Repeat, we are… “

The rest was lost to garbled display of pixels. Compromised? How? The information from the dead slaver’s ship had led him down a cold trail that should have been impossible to detect. Unless… unless it hadn’t been as cold as he thought. What if he were not the only one on their trail?

Still frowning, he tucked the datapad away to study later and continued his search. The drawers in the desk were unlocked, but their contents had been removed. A door on one side of the room opened into a bedroom - small but also clean and expensively furnished.

The door next to it opened into a high-tech medical lab and holding cell. A portable med bed occupied one side of the room, the restraints retracted. One glance at the damaged monitor showed there was no hope of recovering whatever information it had collected about the occupant of the bed.

As he turned to leave, he caught the faint trace of an unfamiliar scent, a lingering sweetness completely out of place amongst both the sterility of the lab and the decay of the surrounding station. He took a deep breath, seeking more of the scent but it remained stubbornly elusive. Had there been a captive here only a short time ago?

Annoyed that he could have come so close without success, he continued his search before finally admitting to himself that the slavers hadn’t left any clues behind. Which meant he was back to combing through the records on the data drive, searching for another lead.

During his search he’d discovered a dimly lit corridor behind a concealed panel. It led away from the hub and he decided to follow it back to his ship, avoiding the traps he’d previously encountered. As he rounded a corner, a flicker of movement up ahead caught his attention. His hand on his dagger, he pressed himself against the wall, blending into the darkness. A small, hunched figure shuffled into view, muttering to himself.

His eyes narrowed. What was a Ssst doing here? They were a notoriously reclusive race and rarely left their home planet. This male was old, his skin wrinkled and his clothing shabby and worn. Harmless enough, if out of place, but Wraith remained cautious. In his line of work, he frequently found that appearances could be deceptive.

He stepped out of the shadows, looming over the elderly male. The creature let out a startled yelp, stumbling backward and cowering against the opposite wall.

“P-please, sir,” he whimpered, his voice quavering. “Don’t hurt me. I-I’m just the cleaner.”

He studied the trembling figure, not entirely sure he believed the frightened facade, although there was no obvious reason to doubt the male.

“Cleaner?” He cast a skeptical look at the rust streaking the walls surrounding them. “Not a very good one apparently.”

The old male wrung his hands together.

“I’m sorry, sir. There’s no one to help me.”

“You’re alone on the station?”

“Yes, sir.”

“There were others here. Where did they go?”

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