Up in orbit, inside the Baraken space station, the Tartarusios lay dormant in the same dock where she had been left. She was crawling with scientists and soldiers. Her technology was a complete mystery to every one of them, from the strange shape of her hull all the way down to her core computer, which ran on a language that no translator in the Empire could recognize. Everyone aboard her was baffled, and the more they tried to understand her, the less they did.
In the middle of all that, deep inside the main hangar where the Orbitons were stored, three cockpits slowly opened. Inside them were three pilots — Tom, Preston and Marek — who had managed to stay hidden when the guards came to take the crew away to the Labyrinth. One after another they climbed out and dropped quietly to the deck.
Preston was the quiet, reckless kind, a man who lived for the hum of engines and the endless pull of the void. He was in his late twenties and carried the calm that only comes from surviving one too many close calls, with permanently windswept brown hair and sharp amber eyes that held the restless glint only pilots ever have. He was lean rather than bulky, all instinct and precision, built like a blade designed for speed. His flight suit was scuffed and worn in places that told stories of narrow escapes. Marek was a different breed altogether. In his mid-twenties, with slightly unruly black hair and calm, alert eyes, he was not the commanding type; he never barked orders or tried to lead, he simply did his job and did it exceptionally well. He was lean but deceptively strong from long hours in cramped cockpits, his hands always steady. He spoke rarely and simply, so that people often mistook his silence for coldness. Those who knew him understood it for what it really was: a grounded loyalty that never needed glory to feel useful.
They had barely taken a step toward the hangar exit when a holographic window shimmered into the air in front of them, and Zoma's face appeared inside it. Somehow she had managed to connect her consciousness to the Tartarusios' main computer from wherever they were keeping her, and all three men stared at her in surprise; they had assumed she had been taken away with the captain's team.
"Hello there," she said. "I don't think introductions are necessary, so I'll keep this short. By now you probably have an idea of what is happening outside. I have a proposition for you. I can't fly the ship off this station on my own — not yet. To launch, we need a manual start. I need you to make your way to the control room and initiate the manual launch. After that, I can take over navigation and bring us to the others."
Tom stepped forward, his eyes narrowing at the flickering projection. "Where are the others? We need to know that first."
Zoma looked directly at him. "They are in a place from which nothing comes back out. A prison — no, a labyrinth. They were sent there after the Emperor's pride was wounded."
Tom frowned. "What do you mean?"
Her voice turned sharp. "Listen to me. We don't have much time. If we want to save them, we have to act now. And you three are not the only ones left aboard. There are other crew members hiding on the first sector's emergency deck. Find them and regroup before you go to the control room."
At that moment the three of them understood how serious it was, and Tom nodded firmly. "Alright, then. It's time for another rescue mission."
The corridors of the Tartarusios were crawling with Baraken soldiers, though, and getting past them undetected would be impossible unless they got creative. Preston's eyes lit up. "I have an idea. We take out a few of them, hide the bodies in the cockpits and use their uniforms as disguises. Then we go to the emergency deck, gather the others, and move to the control room together."
"Good thinking," Tom said. "Let's go."
Near the hangar exit, four soldiers stood guard with their backs to the Orbitons, surrounded by stacks of ammunition boxes that offered just enough cover. Behind them, the three pilots readied the handguns every pilot carried for close defense, and each of them silently chose a target. When the moment came, three soldiers dropped at once, and the fourth spun around in confusion only to fall to a second shot. The pilots rushed to the bodies and dragged them, heavy as they were, one by one into the Orbiton cockpits, then pulled on the stolen Baraken uniforms. The disguises were bulky, but they were convincing.
Armed and hidden in plain sight, they stepped out of the hangar and made their way toward the first sector, which housed the ship's galley — the only non-combat unit aboard, staffed mostly by women brave enough to take on the dangers of space to support the rest of the crew any way they could. They moved through the halls unnoticed until they reached the emergency deck. Tom stepped up to the panel beside its door and entered the access code.
The door hissed open. In that same instant a hand shot out, grabbed him and threw him to the ground, while another snatched the gun out of Preston's hand and leveled it at Marek. For a brief moment, everyone's eyes locked.
Then a voice broke the silence. "Wait — it's me! Youri! Don't shoot!" He lowered the weapon, and his face went from tension to shock. "Holy shit," he said, with a half-laugh. "It's actually you. Damn — I nearly blew your head off."
He reached down to help Tom to his feet, and Tom stared up at him, stunned. "Damn, man. You're here too?"
Youri nodded. Behind him, inside the emergency deck, the others — mostly galley staff and other hidden personnel — broke into smiles as they recognized the three pilots under their stolen uniforms. After hours of hiding in the dark and listening to boots in the corridor outside, they finally had a familiar face in front of them. With it, for the first time since the soldiers came aboard, something that felt like hope.