Rogue

Chapter 3: Good Riddance

The vent access. That was our way out. Not literally.

I was thinking of a hatch, something to spread over an opening. It had to be an alloy that can bend around the protruding object. It also had to be sturdy enough to withstand the sudden balance of pressure when the rock was removed-by someone who wasn’t me.

“Do you know anything like that?” I asked Derya and waited for hell to come down hard on me with shards of hail and tongues of brimstone set ablaze by her everlasting fury.

“Actually, that’s not a stupid idea at all. Give me a minute.” She muttered calmy- to my utter surprise.

“Michi, I need you to do an EVA.” I spoke into the comm after a brief pause.

“Um, no can do.” Michi replied almost immediately with the calmness of a tranquil sea under the lull of low tide. I thought I heard a whack on the other end and an ów’ and some ruckus.

“Derya says I have no balls, so she’ll do it because apparently hers are bigger than the ones I don’t have.” He whined.

“Look, I know Derya is the designated driver and diver. But she needs to be here to install the canvas. And you need to be out there ready to pull out the rock before it adjusts and tears through the seal as well.” I explained. These were goons I was rolling with. But they weren’t without reason. Including-though to a lesser degree- Van Veeken who I was intentionally leaving out of this task force.

“I will do the space walk. Leave the baby alone or it will cry for mummy’s teat.” Derya’s voice came through sharper than the edge of a blade.

“Look, Derya, I know you are the best at everything, but you can’t be everywhere at once. I mean, I wish there were more of you around here maybe this ship would go a little faster.” I paused, not sure if she’d take that as a compliment for how valuable she was or an insult on her capabilities as a pilot and engineer.

“Look, find the canvas and bring it with you. Whatever Michi has to do out there is not nearly as important as what you will be doing in here.” I added when a frigid breeze of silence wafted over the line, chilling the mood.

“Dude, you think pulling out is not important?” Michi’s voice crackled through, carrying more pun than actual lament.

“Okay, now I really have no idea what you are talking about.” I answered, feeling uneasy at Michi’s meaning, especially with a girl on the line.

“You know some of us wish some dudes out there, say 26 years ago had had the sense to pull out. Maybe the universe would be a safer place to live in.” Well, Michi really knew the buttons to punch. And I was starting to give serious thought about sticking my head through that hole in the hull.

“Why are you looking at me?” I heard Derya growl over the line before two or three thwacks accompanied by Michi’s girlish shrill cracked the channel, first in quick succession and then in overlapping rips.

Now I was starting to think Derya might have been right about his balls.

“My parents wanted me, okay? Unlike you waste of sperm, I was loved. I blame the world for taking them from me before I got to know them, and for turning me into a product of its repugnant filth and folly. And they have the brass neck to blame me for my actions. They made me! And they don’t like it when I do what they taught me through pain and torture to do! f**k them!”

Boy, was it getting hot in this suit?

Derya rarely spoke about her past. Now I knew why. The one thing I knew about her, from her demeanor, movement and the way she gave orders, was she was ex-military. Special forces even from the way she took down jargonauts thrice her size. Black ops, from the way she kept her past a blank page in each of our minds. She was a black hole-albeit a tiny one packed full of rage and death- from which nothing but chaos escaped.

“Okay, Derya, have you got it?” I asked when things had cooled down. I realized I was the only one Derya never threatened to beat up. She spoke with the same amount of tenacity and sealed lips as she spoke to everyone, but she listened more to what I had to say than anyone.

She especially loathed Van Veeken. The first few days aboard Rogue 1, he tried to get his way with Derya. I woke up to the sound of grunting, clattering and screaming. When I got there, he had Derya pinned on her back, and she had her fingers locked around his esophagus. I wasn’t much taller than Derya. Van Veeken outweighed the both of us together. I couldn’t do anything.

But Derya didn’t need me to.

“I have taken appendages from men your size and bigger. Trust me boy, you don’t want what’s down there. A lot of men have died trying to get there.” She had said. For the first time, I saw a flinch in Van Veeken’s eye. He knew she didn’t lie. He might be big and strong, but a warrior’s weakness has never been his mortal enemy. It has always been a woman. And this one knew her way around blades.

Since then the two never really spoke. I mean, Van Veeken tried the big boy talk, trying to woo Derya into his bed. Well, he never got to her good side because there wasn’t one. She ignored him the way humans ignore the appendix. She had promised to take a toe for him laying hands on her. He’d said with a cocky smug smirk that he’d love to see her try.

We were still waiting for the fateful day when mommy and daddy would clash swords again. More like, dreading it. A fight like that would mean our crew would grow smaller. And I didn’t want to lose Derya. She was the glue that held this ship together-quite literally. I didn’t care much about Van Veeken but I’d rather he were here, just in case we encountered some giant spiders and needed someone their size to take them on.

A couple of minutes later, Derya hightailed through the whiteness of the gas, some kind of foil in her hand. She barely noticed I was there, getting straight to work. I guess that was her way of avoiding her natural impulse to toss me into space-which meant she either forgave me or she still needed me alive. After observing the layout of the object, she signaled for me to hold one end of the foil while she bolted the other around the rock. She worked with unnatural agility. Clearly, she had a talent unmatched anywhere. It’s a shame the world made her then cast her out. Didn’t know what to do with her.

“Michi you ready?” I asked over the comms. Of course, he wasn’t. What was I thinking bothering to ask?

“I’m sitting in a rover I know not how to ride, heading out into a place darker than Derya’s heart. What do you think?” His voice came through a little shaky.

“I think you’ll do just fine.” A baby smile smeared itself across my lips. There wasn’t a whole lot to be amused about aboard the old rackety ship, so little moments like these were gems in a desert of dirt.

“Okay listen Michi,” Derya started after securing the canvas in place. “We are currently moving at forty thousand miles an hour. The debris seems to be stable at this speed. We don’t want to upset this balance by altering speed. We don’t know what it might do to the hull if we slowed down. You are going to have to do a live-chase EVA.” She paused.

“Wait, hold on a second. I am going outside a ship moving at what, Mac 100? Are you guys frigging kidding me?” Michi was on edge.

“You won’t feel it as long as you are tethered to the ship.” I chipped in as a more comforting voice.

“Actually, you might be flung around in the wake of the rock if it’s huge enough. You will have to fire thruster engines to stabilize.” Derya said, her voice level and without regret.

“Not helping.” I whispered to Derya before clearing my throat over Michi’s panicked curses. “We will walk you through everything. You’ve got this buddy!”

“Klein, I am not your buddy!” Michi’s voice snapped, sharp and short of breath.

“Okay then, f**k you too!” I boomed over the comm and Derya bust out laughing. It was a sound I’d never heard before. And it was…beautiful. Magical. Something I wouldn’t mind hearing again.

“Michi, you have to do this, the longer that log stays jammed into our butt, the more vulnerable we are. It could rip through this whole wing, touch the Engine room and then we’ll be done for.” She said, not flinching at the imagery of a giant rock stuck up our…what she said.

When Michi didn’t answer, she went on. “I am going to walk you through every step. If I could make it over there in time to take over from your lazy ass, I would. But as it turns out, we actually need you for something today. So suck it up and drive!” Well, I hoped Michi didn’t decide to open the hangar gates and jump out.