Foundation of All

“We’ll be taking the illegal weapon and deconstructing it. You will be levied a fine for destruction of property and banned from all work spaces for at least five thousand years, which may be lowered on probation.”

Samir said it drably as if it was mundane and business usual. Sean clenched his fist and Lira visibly held herself back from immediately protesting.

“Don’t we have any way to appeal this?” Sean said, “Lars was attacking us, Ash only did what he did to defend us. I’ll pay the fine, be banned from the workshops. That’s fair, I installed the weapons on him. But we can take those out. Ash shouldn’t be destroyed just because the Immortal Council loves Lars so damn much.”

“You can’t deconstruct Ash,” Lira added, jumping in and stepping between Ash’s bulky form and Samir in his flowing robes, “She’s a person just the same as you and me. You’d be killing her by doing this.”

Samir eyed them for a moment, “Now, I know how attached people can get to their machines, but don’t be ridiculous. Rumors of intelligent machines are simply not true. Or at least they aren’t for long. The Plaguebringers make sure of that… I know it’s painful, but you’ll get over it in a few centuries. Don’t be difficult and make things any worse for yourselves.”

“This is wrong!” Lira cried, “You can’t do this. Tell them, Ash! He doesn’t know how intelligent you are.”

Ash looked down at her before looking at Samir, “I feel like an intelligent being. How could I prove my intelligence in a way that you would be satisfied with?”

“Nothing,” Samir said with disinterest, “You are property, and you will be destroyed. I and the rest of the Immortal Council are firm on this. Your very presence here brings danger to this whole station.”

“What danger?” Lira demanded, “What aren’t you telling us?”

Samir waved his hand his face quickly developing an uglier expression the longer he spoke, “That is for us to know and for you to not. We are the Immortal Council. We rule the galaxy with a light hand. But do not think that we are weak enough to bow to the demands of Immortals who are not even ten thousand years old yet. I don’t know how you got Brenda’s support for that laughable excuse for an accusation, Lira. She should have known better. We’re Immortals, and you’re complaining of something as little as the pain that we’ve all long since grown past! The whining of petulant children forced the entire Immortal Council to gather and wasted all of our time that could be spent on more important issues to the galaxy. If Lars hit you, then you should have just hit him back!”

Lira shrunk back a little at Samir’s harsh words as Samir's face radiated his annoyance and distain. As Sean stepped forward to give Samir a piece of his mind, Samir whirled on him and continued.

“And don’t let me forget you, Sean. Brought to us by the Plaguemother herself! I should have known you would cause trouble ever since you came here no matter how clueless you seemed. You’re lucky I’m being even as merciful as I’m already being! Do you have any idea how hard I had to argue to make sure you weren’t arrested immediately after the Plaguemother left? You’re only out here free enjoying time with your little girlfriend because of all the work I did for you. I should have both of you thrown in prison for a million years just to avoid all the headache you’ve both caused me! I’ve worked more in the last century than the last three millennia before that combined.”

Samir’s initially calm tone had grown louder and ever more irate as he went along until he was practically shouting at the two of them.

The room went silent as the two armored guards at the door exchanged a glance with each other before returning to staring at Ash waiting for any hostile movements.

“Samir, you piece of…” Sean said angrily, but was interrupted as suddenly a loud alarm sounded throughout the station. Samir immediately went pale and rushed to the door. The booming alarms kept going as Samir inspected his holopad quickly. He stood in the door frame before hesitating and turning back to them.

“Make sure they stay here,” Samir ordered to the guards, “As for you two, I’ll deal with you and your robot later. I’ve got more important matters to deal with now. Don’t think this is over.”

The two of them stared at the stony faced guards that remained at the door blocking the way with oversized pistols at their sides, held loosely in their grips. The alarm continued blaring all through the hallway, even heard through the now firmly shut and locked door to Sean’s room.

Sean had a staring contest at the two guards for a few moments before he noticed that he couldn’t see Lira anymore. He glanced around and just barely caught a glimpse of her hair sticking out from behind Ash who stood immobile.

Sean quickly went behind to follow her, the guards following his motion with their eyes but not stepping away from the door. He noticed that Lira was typing something on her holopad on the table behind where Ash stood, blocking the view of the door.

“What are you doing?” Sean whispered as she sent off a message.

“Getting us and Ash out of here,” Lira replied just as quietly, “You heard him. The Council hates us, thinks that… that… that Lars hitting me is just some sort of… joke or something. They're suspicious of you because of the Immortal who saved you. We can’t let them kill Ash. We just can’t. Please, Sean.”

Sean hesitated for a moment before nodding, “Well, I wasn’t going to leave Ash either. What’s the plan?”

Lira let out a sigh of relief, “Great. I’m sending a message to Brenda. If she can distract the guards and get them to turn around then Ash can blast them and let us escape. She should know where we can find a hyperdrive capable ship. If anyone would help us, then she would.”

“Are you sure?” Sean asked just to verify, “I know she won’t betray us, but it’s asking a lot from her to do this.”

“She wants to leave, she’s only here for money anyways. She hinted during our… uh, training… that she would help me leave if I ever needed to. Since you need approval through the Immortal Council to do it and they didn’t appear to like me very much at my accusation against Lars.”

Her face flashed with anger for a second, “I guess we know why now,”

Sean put a hand on her shoulder, “Hey, we don’t care what they think. Right? They're the same people that want to kill Ash just for existing.”

“Yeah... Yeah, you’re right. I’ve sent the message. Now we just have to wait for her to prepare things and then break us out. I’m sure she’ll do it.”

The alarm cut off all of a sudden, leaving them all in silence.

Sean leaned in and whispered even softer than before, “I have to get something from my room. I’ll be right back.”

Before she could respond he straightened and confidently walked to his room door.

“Hey! Where are you going?” one of the guards called out.

“To my room?” Sean said as casually as he could, “Am I not allowed to go in there?”

The man hesitated before shaking his head, “Fine. But don’t try anything funny. Don’t think some puny pellet shooter you manage to cobble together in there will be able to match our armor.”

“I guess not,” Sean agreed. Apparently their armor was for more than just for show. Hopefully Ash would be able to overpower it when the moment arrived. Even now Sean could see Lira standing up on the tips of her toes directly behind Ash. She was leaning forward and softly whispering something into where his auditory sensors were, her lips practically covering them as she spoke. Presumably telling him the plan.

Sean closed the room door behind him with a click and quickly rushed to his bed. He let out a sigh of relief when he saw the storage device for his Foundation of All world was there and intact. It was an irrational fear, but at this point it was his only way he would ever be able to meet Emily again in this vast galaxy. There were just so many mysteries swirling around her, and she would know better than anyone what they could do once they made it away from this place. Him, Lira, and Ash together.

Sean tucked the all important device into his pocket and patted it to make sure the bulge there wasn’t too visible. Then he walked back into the main room and stood waiting next to Lira. Now, they could only hope that Brenda would come before Samir came back…

It felt like forever until there was finally a knock on the door to the room. “Sean? Lira? Are you in there?” Brenda’s voice said through the door, “What’s this about?”

Sean glanced at Lira in confusion but she nodded her head slightly. This was part of the plan.

“Helloooooo?” Roger’s called after neither of them said anything, “I was promised entertainment. Don’t leave me out in the cold like this.”

The two of them glanced at each other in confusion. What was Roger doing here? The two guards turned away from Sean and Lira and began discussing what they should do. They were debating between ignoring the two outside and just opening the door to tell her to go away directly.

After coming to a decision, the guard on the right put his hand on the door and began to turn the handle… Only for his head to explode under Ash’s surprise laser beam from behind. The other guard’s eyes widened, and he pressed a button on his belt. The next laser beam hit a translucent shield around him that quickly began to grow brighter and brighter.

“Overclocking Antimatter reactor,” Ash stated calmly and the laser immediately grew much brighter and a second later broke through the shield and through the guard's head. Ash turned to the other one on the floor and blasted him with a low intensity laser again to evaporate his almost fully regenerated head.

Ash stepped forward and dragged the two bodies away from the door. Sean stared at the two of them and realized that they couldn’t escape with no way to imprison or capture these two. Ash couldn’t just keep vaporizing their heads while they made their escape.

The door opened and Brenda and Roger rushed in and took in the scene inside.

Ash vaporized the two guards' heads again.

“Alright,” Brenda said, taking charge, “You, big robot. Next time you vaporize their heads push them together so where their heads would regenerate would be overlapping.”

Ash turned its head to Lira who nodded at him.

“Do it,” Lira said, “We can trust her.”

Ash complied and after two more laser blasts quickly used his strength to shove the two bodies so they lay opposite each other with their heads slowly forming in flakes of bone.

Everyone except for Brenda watched in horror as the bodies regenerated on top of each other, creating a monstrosity with assorted facial features. Noses, eyes, mouths, all appearing for a moment only to be dissolved away again and replaced with something else. Occasionally one of the bodies would twitch slightly as one of the two sets of facial features would win out over the other for a moment.

“Alright, let’s go,” Brenda said in a no nonsense tone, “If no one finds them then it should take a few days at least before they separate again naturally. Don’t worry, no matter how horrific it looks, their brains are currently overlapping so neither of them are feeling anything at all right now.”

“Well, that’s a real comfort,” Roger quipped as he kept staring down at the horror show of dissolving and shifting faces in front of him.

“What are you doing here, Roger?” Sean asked.

Roger tapped his chest, “A genuine criminal I am. Apparently I am your ‘best friend’ or something and you didn’t even think to tell me about all of this! Haven’t I told you how much I’m looking for an adventure, and you think I’m going to miss a chance like this? The parties scene here got old centuries ago, who cares if I get in trouble for helping you guys get out? Brenda here caught me up to speed when she heard what had happened.”

Sean looked at Brenda who shrugged, “What can I say,” she said, “Seemed like he really wanted to go when he spied on my messages over my shoulder. You’re lucky that the survival class was just me and him when the message came or we might have been in real trouble.”

“Well, I ah, did do that,” Roger admitted, “But it all worked out for the best. That’s in the past now. Adventure awaits!”

“Alright, calm down there,” Brenda said with a slight smirk, “I’ve already found us some ships to steal. Some real luxury ships from people with more money than sense. You all take one and I’ll take the other. Get to the edge of the system and enter hyperspace where they can’t catch you. After you’re done, remember my lessons. They’ll help you out there in the real world.”

“You aren’t coming with us?” Lira asked, sounding disappointed.

“No, Lira,” Brenda said, “But that doesn’t mean we’ll never see each other again. I gave you the coordinates for my base, remember? Come visit when you want to take a break from adventuring. You don’t want me around hovering over you.”

“Yeah, well…” Lira said, mumbling a little.

“You’ll do fine, kid. Ash and the two boys will help you if you get in trouble. Right?”

“Yes”

“Yes”

“Affirmative.”

“See? Now stop moping and let’s get out of here.”

They walked out of the door, being very careful to act verrrrry casual. Nothing suspicious at all to see here, no reason to stop them.

And surprisingly the tactic worked. Immortus station was practically empty, and not a single member of the Security team was visible as they made their way to the ship docking bays.

They reached the door connecting the station to the two ships, and Brenda quickly walked over to the screen next to one of the shut doors. She cracked her knuckles and then started absolutely flying through the digital menus doing who knows what.

“Yes… still a bit rusty… Oh, a new firewall. Nope, still not enough. Through in seconds, on to the next…” Brenda muttered as she hacked the door. After an extremely tense five minutes, the airlock door hissed and slid open.

They all walked inside and Brenda started working on the access to the ship itself.

“Hey Brenda, will there be anyone inside there?” Sean said suddenly as the thought struck him.

“Probably not,” Brenda said dismissively, “These people are rich enough to own dozens of these kinds of ship at a time. They probably won’t even notice that it’s gone until they stop having to pay the docking fees.”

The door to the ship slid open. “Damn, I’m good,” She said proudly as they entered the ship itself. It took some missed turns, but they eventually reached the command deck and Brenda got to work again.

After twenty minutes or so, Brenda was done.

“Alright, Command status is transferred to all of you. Except for your robot of course. As far as the ship is concerned you are and always have been its proud owner. But whenever you get a chance I would comb through this thing for any kind of trackers left behind in this thing. It’s not too common, but best to check just in case. If none of you know how to pilot, then use the AI for now.”

Brenda cocked her head to the side and thought for a long moment with pursed lips.

“Hmmmmm. Yep. I think that’s it. Any questions?”

There was silence for a few moments as Brenda scanned the room.

“Alright, great. Now it’s time to get my own ship. Don’t wait for me before taking off, I can handle myself. I suppose now it’s time for goodbyes.”

Lira leapt forward and wrapped Brenda in a hug that seemed to surprise the woman.

“Thank you so much for everything, Brenda. For helping me so much, and getting us out. I’ll have so much to tell you when we see each other again.”

Brenda’s voice wavered slightly, “I… You’re welcome, Lira. I’m just glad I made a difference. Now, um…”

She cleared her throat and looked at Sean.

“Sean!” She barked and he immediately stiffened in place instinctively, “You treat this woman right! You got that!”

“Yes, Ma’am!”

She glanced at Roger, “And you! You… try not to have too much fun.”

“Errr. Okay?”

Finally, Brenda turned to Ash. “And you! Well… keep your head down. Plaguebringers hate intelligent machines with a passion and you don’t want those nutjobs gunning for you.”

“Understood,”

“Bye everyone. Lira. I’ll see you soon. Stay safe.”

With that Brenda quickly walked away, the command console letting out a little chirp as she left the ship.

They waited a few minutes before finally bringing themselves to get the ship moving away from the station. All of them worried about Brenda somehow getting caught as she stole the other ship with no one there to back her up.

But forty minutes after they started moving out under the guidance of the AI pilot, they all sighed in relief as they saw Brenda’s stolen ship begin to move as well.

They all waited with nervous tension for another hour as they slowly maneuvered away from the station on a carefully prescribed flight path by the station’s automated systems. Using the larger thrusters of the ship too close to the station would damage it, so until they were far enough away they could only inch away at a snail’s pace.

Finally, the ship rumbled as the larger thrusters started to kick in and they started to pick up speed. Immortus Station and Brenda’s stolen ship quickly faded into tiny dots of light in the cold void of space after another hour.

It would be eight hours until they reached the edge of the system and then they could hyperspace jump out. Sean hadn’t realized just how dangerous Emily’s in system hyperspace jump truly had been when he had just met her. If the slightest thing had gone wrong then they would have exploded and chunks of them would be scattered across a distance of light years. Who knows how far from a star system in interstellar space Sean’s body would have ended up reforming…

They all paced around nervously and made stilted small talk as time passed and their ship came closer and closer to the edge of this solar system. But no matter how much they worried, nothing bad happened. No one hailed them, no one asked what they were doing out here. Time simply passed and before they knew it they passed the barrier. Without their input, the AI pilot automatically activated the hyperdrive and then the stars twisted around them outside and they were off.

They all let out sighs of relief. They had made it. They had escaped from Immortus Station, and saved Ash. And got a fancy new ship too as a nice bonus…