Fugitive Telemetry (The Murderbot Diaries #6)(33)

Human One said, “They use SecUnits up in the processing centers, not in the backrocks where we were most of the time.”

When the sixth human tumbled into the bag, it signaled that it was at capacity and ready to leave. I let the module’s hatch close. Then I wished I’d left a drone in the bag so I could monitor it directly. Whatever, I was just going to have to trust the damn bag.

At least I had its channel as an input and could tell it had sealed itself and scooted off to take the most direct route back to its “home” airlock. “How long will it take?” Human Three asked.

“Not long, just a few minutes,” I said. If we were lucky, there would be time for a second trip and I wouldn’t have to do this the hard way.

A vibration traveled through the hull and the humans flinched. “What was that?” Human Two demanded.

“They’re trying to dump us!” Human Four’s voice was shrill. He was right, someone in the bridge had tried (and failed, because I had control of SecSystem and it was preventing the command from going through) to release the clamps on the module. Something had spooked the hostiles and they were trying to dump the incriminating module and leave. Well, crap. Time to shift to Plan B. I connected to the station’s feed and used it to send the “proceed” code to the responder. Since there was no point in hiding anymore, I also sent a feed message to Aylen and told her refugees were incoming to the colony ship.

Human One took a sharp breath. “Thanks for trying, Station Security.”

Above us the ship’s camera picked up a hostile in an armored suit, the one that the refugees had mistaken for a SecUnit, stepping into view of the hold camera near the jury-rigged lock above us. Oh, I get it. The hostile wasn’t strong enough to activate the manual release without the armor. But I’d finally found the code they used for the jury-rigged hatch.

In one of my shows, this would have been a great time to say something brave and encouraging. I suck at that, so I said, “Get to the back of the module, on the floor, and cover your heads.”

I checked my input for the life-tender; it had reached the colony ship’s hull and was blorping along toward the airlock. In my peripheral vision, Human One jerked her head at the others and they scrambled toward the far end of the module. I said, “When I yell clear, I need you to follow me up into the ship.”

Skeptically, Human One said, “How are you gonna—”

I pulled my explosive projectile weapon off its strap, then climbed the folded cargo rack nearest the module lock, braced my feet against the bulkhead, and held on with my free arm. As the armored hostile leaned down to reach the release, I triggered the ship’s system to open the jury-rigged hatch.

It rotated open with a hiss of released air, and the module immediately smelled better.

I didn’t move. The camera showed the armored hostile jerking back in surprise. A panicky yell from a hostile on the bridge came over the comm; they must have realized the bot pilot was unresponsive. But the armored hostile couldn’t pull the release now, while the lock was open, without depressurizing the ship. (I’d also frozen open all the interior hatches, which, from the additional yelling over the comm, was something the bridge crew had just discovered.)

The armored hostile hesitated. Come on, look down here, you know you want to. There was going to be an orientation change between the ship’s gravity field and the module’s gravity field, and I’d have to take it into account. The humans huddled at the far end of the module, frozen, waiting.

The armored hostile leaned down and cautiously extended a weapon through the lock.

(I already knew it wasn’t another SecUnit inside that suit, but this was another giveaway. A SecUnit would have moved fast, propelling itself into the module. There’s no point in being cautious when your job is to draw fire, right?)

I woke my drones as I grabbed the armored arm and yanked it down. Twisting the hostile’s weapon free and dropping it, I swung myself over to clamp my body around the armor’s helmet and upper body.

I have a file of access codes I could have used to take control of the armor, but that would take time, and this was an expensive brand and might be newer than my code list. Another reason this wasn’t a SecUnit—our armor was never this nice.

With my chest clamped to its helmet, Armored Hostile couldn’t see and events were moving a little too fast for it to take advantage of the armor’s scan, cameras, or defensive functions. I jammed the nozzle of my projectile weapon into the back neck joint where the important parts were, switched it to full power, and fired. The armor spasmed (an explosive projectile in your motor control functions will do that) and went limp.

My drones shot up through the lock and the hold, and straight into the faces of the two hostiles in tactical gear running toward us down the corridor. They screamed and flailed backward.

I climbed around the dead weight of the armored hostile and up into the ship. Then I dragged the body out of the way and yelled, “Clear!”

I took a guard position at the inner hatch and watched my drones zip through the ship. Behind me the humans scrambled to climb up through the hatch, exhausted and struggling, trying to help each other. When the last one collapsed on the deck, gasping at the fresh air, I let the lock close. That was a relief. Now that there was no more danger of everybody getting sucked into space, I checked my other inputs.

I had confirmation from the bag that it had delivered its humans to the colony ship, where the airlock had accepted its safety code and cycled them through. The responder had sent a confirmation code, and, according to the hostile ship’s SecSystem, had just hailed the hostiles and informed them that they were about to be apprehended.