Murmansk-13

Hernandez hadn’t really had time to question the origins of his captors, and he doubted they would answer any of his queries. They weren’t infected and weren’t members of Dr. Smith’s organization, which meant they were outliers like Jamal, Oleg and Katja. Survivors who’d eked out an existence within the corrupted confides of Murmansk-13, working together.

In his brief time with Jamal he’d seen the best brought out by the station. Now Hernandez realized that like the disease, the decay of the station was contagious. That, or he was hostage to some extremely ruthless pendejos. Neither option afflicted his nihilistic apathy. They’d killed a fellow survivor and Hernandez was a stranger, albeit one they seemed to need.

“Put on the suit,” the bald man pointed at the escape unit with the shank.

Hernandez eyed the suit like a bad prom dress. “It’s covered in blood.” He knelt beside the body, difficult to balance with his hands behind his back and studied the stab wound in the man’s neck. The flesh had keyholed as he’d struggled or convulsed. “Did you puncture the suit, ain’t no fucking use to anyone if you shanked it up.”

The big man leered at Hernandez with disdain, he brought the improvised weapon to bare and wagged it in the air at arm’s length. “I stab once,” he pointed to the back of his neck, “through the spine.”

No denial then. No remorse, either. They’d seen the man’s death as necessary and they were going outside. A sickening realization struck Hernandez. “You want me to take you to my ship, don’t you?”

The big man’s lips curled back in a gruesome, lupine approximation of a smile.

☣☭☠

Something had happened to Hernandez, she sensed it deep inside. A visceral knowing of loss forced her starved stomach to clench. So much time had passed since he’d left, now she knew he wouldn’t return. Hernandez was dead or injured, because Tala knew he would never abandon them.

There would be no time to grieve. As she watched Jamal mentally prepare to kill his friend, kill a man who’d risked his life to save theirs, Tala knew all of their time was running out.

And she had no plan. Hernandez had been it. If she chose to mourn anything it would be the hand fate had dealt her. To place Katja on the same trajectory as herself, only to steal away all that potential.

The logical next step would be acceptance. Only the mere thought of accepting this fate left Tala bitter. They’d fought so damn hard, circumvented death so many times. Yet each episode of survival had decanted them into the next, eventually diluting them into the cells. Fish in a barrel. Cornered.

Katja obviously saw the anguish in her expression, herself serene in the final throes; she sidled up to Tala and took her hand. The girls fingers were pale against Tala’s skin. And so very cold. “You don’t think Hernandez is coming back?”

Tala shook her head and squeezed her eyes closed, the single tear that extruded itself through her eyelids was one of frustration, not of sadness for her friend and that made her angrier still.

“You did everything you could,” Katja whispered. Behind her Diego trembled, resigned and fearful. He also sensed that time was ebbing away. By comparison, the Captains expression was little modified, he looked more tired, more dehydrated – but he was already gone.

“It wasn’t enough,” replied Tala. The words wracked with catharsis.

Beyond the cells, the antechamber and the processing desk, Tala heard activity. They all did. Eyes darted to the Perspex hydraulic doors, Diego stood up and took an anxious half-step back.

The stuttering sound of the security entrance door mechanism whined dully into the cellblock.

“Oh, God,” said Diego, breathlessly.

Tala felt Katja’s grip tighten in her hand, could see her jaw quiver. Katja had been safe in the gelid darkness of the morgue, cocooned from the corruption of the station in a senseless void. Of them all, fate had been most cruel to her. If they just left her alone…

But they hadn’t.

The second hydraulic door peeled back, out of sight. No time.

“They’re in hazmat suits,” said Jamal, he leant grimacing from his post beside Oleg. “Two of them.”

A thought occurred to Tala, a plan of sorts, nebulous and extempore in the extreme. There were limitations when wearing hazmat suits, she’d drilled in bio units when working on a vessel carrying volatile organics. It probably wouldn’t work, but the alternative was unpalatable.

“I need you to stand over there,” Tala said addressing Katja, words tumbling from her mouth. She turned to Diego. “You too and fucking drag the Captain if you need to. I need you to draw their eye.”

Tala let Katja’s hand go. Katja looked at Tala bemused, then at Diego. She shrugged, uninformed and in lieu of a superior option they both acquiesced. Before the soldiers could scope her position, Tala backed into the corner of the cell, pressing herself into the bars. There was no cover, if either turned when entering the cellblock the plan would fail.