Page 14 of Mutant Mine

“I say we send out a signal luring another ship to us — then when they come aboard, we kill every one of them, and take their vessel!” yells one bulky man.

“There’s nothing else out here!” someone else hollers back. “That signal may take longer to reach them than we have oxygen, you dumb fuck!”

The dumb fuck in question leaps off the stage with his teeth bared, and the two fall to the ground in a tangle of flailing limbs, soon swallowed by the jeering crowd.

“Why don’t we just force the crew to fly us wherever we want?” asks another.

“Because some goddamn idiot killed the Captain, that’s why. And the rest of the crew ain’t good for nothin’!”

The rest of the crew? Does that mean others are still alive?!

“Then why don’t we just kill ‘em? They’re just usin’ up our oxygen…”

There is a murmur of approval for this idea — but another voice cuts through. It’s the last voice in the world I want to hear.

“Because,” booms Roth, “They have value. If this ship is recaptured by the authorities, they will be our only bargaining chip.”

He’s walking through the crowd — which parts around him. Their shouts die down, and a natural hush descends. He is such an eldritch figure: standing head and shoulders taller than the rest, with his blue-twined skin and his crown of horns. A delirious thought floats through my oxygen-deprived mind:How does he get a t-shirt on over those things?

I’ve gotten so used to seeing Roth caged, in semi-darkness. It’s shocking to see him in this clean, brightly lit space where I eat my meals and laugh with my bunkmates. It’s like watching an escaped tiger padding between picnic tables at the zoo.

“We will put the surviving crew into maximum security cells. Bring them food. Keep them alive until we are sure we are free.”

“And why should we do what you tell us?” asks another tall, muscled prisoner. Curling his lip, he spits at Roth’s feet. “Freak.”

Roth looks down, then back up at the man. Without a word, he reaches out both hands, and seizes the man by either side of his face. The man has barely started to get out an outraged cry of “Hey!” when Roth promptly snaps his neck.

I gasp out loud, and my hands fly to my mouth. Thecasualnessof it. I don’t know what I expected… Perhaps a fight? For his opponent to have even the tiniest shred of a chance? Roth killed him like I would swat a fly; as if he was nothing.

Nauseated, I watch as he drops the dead body to the floor like trash and steps over it without a backwards glance.

He’s not even a man anymore,I think.He’s a creature from a bad dream.

The gathered men are tense and silent now, waiting to see what Roth does next.

“I do not wish to take this ship by force,” he says. “I will prove that I can lead you. Who here knows how to pilot this ship?”

No one speaks.

“I do,” says Roth. “And I will navigate us to safety. Allow me one hour to prove myself, then I will return, and you may all decide.”

Well, it’s getting colder all the time, and I feel faint, which tells me that oxygen is starting to get low — so there’s no complaints from me. If he wants to have a go at pressing some random buttons on the flight deck, he can go right ahead.

Everybody else must feel the same, because no one stops him as he walks out of the canteen.

We must all be thinking the same thing, though. It’s bullshit. There’s simply no way he knows how to pilot a government starship. Only specialized pilots are trained to do that. It’s highly technical, and a closely guarded secret, to prevent Earth’s most advanced technology from falling into the wrong hands.

I crawl through the vent shaft just far enough to see that Roth really is headed towards the flight deck. Between the falling oxygen, the shock, the teeth-chattering cold, and mysore body (bruised when I ran into obstacles in the dark), I don’t have the energy to follow him. So I do what the rest of the men do: stay in the canteen area and wait.

About an hour must pass. I’m almost dozing off, curled into a ball against the cold metal. Then, from the belly of the ship, there comes a rumble — loud at first at first, like something bursting into life, then settling down into the quiet, constant purr that had been the background noise to our whole journey.

That was the superluminal core flaring on. No way. The engines are up and running again!

But wait… How was Roth able to operate the ship’s controls? Did the terrorists figure it out somehow? I guess that they must have had some serious scientific ability, to do… whatever it is they did to their DNA. Or did they capture a government pilot and torture them for information?

Soon, tendrils of warmth are flowing from the heating pipes around me, and I can feel that I’m breathing clean, freshly oxygenated air. The men must feel it too, and I hear whoops and relieved laughter from below me. I drag myself back towards a vent to watch.

Roth strides back into the room and mounts the platform of tables. He turns to face the crowd.

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