"Dammit! Those assholes have disabled the autonav systems on all of the escape pods," Glenn spat bitterly. "And the starboard hatches are all locked and powered off."

Rico sputtered, "But disabling escape pods is against regs! What if there's a fire or..." and Rico trailed off as Glenn stopped typing and gave him a withering glare.

Kai shook his head as he continued frantically pulling cable from a junction box, then asked, "Either of you guys able to fly? I'm pretty sure I can override the proximity safety on the portside pods, but without the autonav, I'm not sure if we could steer one safely away from Vanguard."

Rico shook his head and then peered nervously through the small hatch window. "Whatever we're going to do, we've got to make it quick. I think I see some flickering up the corridor, and none of our guys would be using lights."

Kai looked at Glenn, who was deep in thought. "Well?" Kai said. "Can you fly?"

Glenn sighed, then shook his head. "If I could fly, do you think I'd be counting crates on this bucket? But I think I'd rather take my chances in the pod than stick around here and get a brain transplant or hypnosis or whatever horror awaits us in sick bay. Besides, if we can just make it past the Vanguard, hopefully we can get clear of their jamming and warn the fleet."

Kai looked dubious. "Dude, those proximity safeties are there for a reason. The escape pods are designed to get you to a safe distance in a hurry, and they're not subtle about it. The autonav--or even a trained pilot--might be able to react quickly enough, but if you or I tried, we'd end up decorating the Vanguard's hull plating. Let's figure out something else."

Glenn frowned, but then smiled. "So they've been focused on cutting off our escape, and there's no way we can safely launch a capsule. But what if we tried to do it unsafely?"

Rico shook his head. "I don't know what they're doing to our guys, but they all still seem to be alive. Count me out if you're planning on offing yourself decoratively."

Glenn shrugged. "I'm pretty ambivalent about checking out or sticking around, but that's not what I'm talking about. Kai, you said it earlier: If you can disable the proximity safeties and force a launch without the autonav, the capsule won't be able to steer away from the Vanguard, which means..."

Kai thought for a second, then smiled. "Which means for the first time today, we actually have access to a weapon!"

---------------------

"Hey guys," Rico hissed. "You're not going to believe this: The guys in the corridor with the guns are friendlies...Andy and Luke and that mess hall guy from the meeting. Frank, I think? It looks like they found some guns, so maybe we should try working with them?"

Glenn continued typing frantically as Kai finished tucking the spliced cabling back into the access hatch. Kai whispered, "We agreed to go our separate ways... they do their mission and we do ours."

Rico gave a disbelieving snort. "Yeah, but what if one of them can fly? Wait, Andy's from the bridge crew, isn't he? Maybe he's a pilot? We could see..." Rico trailed off. After a long pause, he continued. "Umm. Never mind."

Kai finished latching the access port and then moved stealthily to the hatch. "What?" he whispered to Rico. "Spit it out."

Rico sighed and said, "Never mind...their eyes... they're fucking glowing! Uh, and they're looking right at me. Crap."

-----------------------

Chen pushed his head out of the maintenance conduit and glanced over at Wayne and Jim, who both looked at him optimistically. Chen sighed and shook his head, saying "No joy. The armory is still sealed up tight as a drum. They must be bringing their weapons over from Vanguard. And judging from the number of troopers I saw through the vents, I think they brought over their entire marine contingent, too. "

Wayne groaned, "Well, there goes plan D. Without the shaped charges, I don't think we're going to be able to disable the main drive system. What about the EVA kit? If we could get suited up and force one of the airlocks..."

Chen hoisted himself out of the conduit and carefully lowered himself to the deck. "No luck there, either. That entire compartment was locked down, and they had cut power to the door mechanism. We might be able to route power to it and force it open, but I don't think we have that kind of time. The quartermaster room wasn't locked down, but the only weapons I could find in there were training dummies."

Jim paced back and forth as Chen talked, chewing his fingernails nervously. "So we're trapped like rats, basically. Maybe we should just give up trying to warn the fleet and just hole up until the heat dies down. My buddy Alex and I noticed a cofferdam that wasn't on the schematics and figured out how to access it. We've been using it for transporting some, ummm... special sought-after items the fleet tends to disfavor. It's not that far away, and we could hole up in there until the heat dies down!" Jim said hopefully.

Wayne looked grim. "We have a mission to complete. Even though the ship is crawling with their troopers, we can't just hide and wait for them to grab us," Wayne said, then paused, deep in thought.

"What?" Jim asked warily. "Did you figure out another place we can get some explosives?"

Wayne smiled and shook his head. "No, but I think it's time for the three of us to head to the quartermaster room. Oh and Chen... it might be a good time for you to get captured."

-------------

As Rico lay dazed on the deck, he tried to figure out what had happened. He flopped his head to the side, but his entire field of vision was washed-out white and all he could hear was a high-pitched ringing. He could faintly perceive a few blurry shapes moving around him. Even though he was flat on the floor, his head was still spinning and foggy.

"The hatch," he thought groggily. "Andy's team overrode the lock, but couldn't get in because we pushed..." Rico's musing was interrupted as he felt hands roughly grab his arms and flip him over onto his stomach. "Shit." He thought. "Looks like they got in. I think we might be..."

Rico felt his shirt being pulled up around his neck, exposing his back to the cold air. He tried to free himself from the hands that were holding him in place, but in his weakened state he was only succeeded in wiggling slightly as the hands clamped him down with an iron grip. Suddenly, he gasped as he felt something cold and slimy squirming around on his spine. He was about to yell something suitably profane when he felt a series of sharp stings up and down his spine. His limbs immediately went limp, and although he could feel that his arms and legs had been released from the attackers' grips, he was completely unable to move them. Rico could not move his head or even his eyes and his vision was still mostly still washed out--although now with a distinct blue tint. Despite that, he could faintly perceive blurry shapes he assumed were Andy and his team, who were putting a long glowing blue thing onto a prone shape lying on the floor next to him.

"They are giving him his new master," Rico suddenly realized, feeling a rush of calm and happiness wash over him. "Just like they gave me mine." Rico found that he could now move his arms and legs and tried to stand up before immediately collapsing to his knees again from the vertigo. His ears were still ringing and his vision was still basically a smeary whitish-blue blur, but he groaned and reached out to his fellow slaves and frantically tried to get their attention. He could see two glowing blue points come toward him and felt one of Andy's team (he couldn't tell which one) grab him by his shoulders and try to say something to him. Rico couldn't really hear anything he was saying because of the continued ringing in his ears, although he thought he could make out something about a flash.

Rico held up his hand and started to yell a warning, but was immediately wracked with a coughing fit. He felt increasing panic--not because he couldn't breathe--but because he would fail his masters if he couldn't stop their hosts' foolish, destructive plan. He finally was able to clear his throat and croaked out, "The pods! You have to stop the pods!"

As his eyes began to clear, he could see Andy yelling close to his face. He still couldn't make out everything, but from the parts he picked out it seemed clear that Andy and his team did not understand what Rico, Glenn, and Kai had done. "Tell the bridge to cut all power to the portside escape pods RIGHT NOW!" he bellowed. That finally appeared to do the trick, as Andy let go of his shoulders and wheeled around, making a bee line for the comm panel. Rico collapsed to his knees and looked over at the rest of his team. Glenn and Kai both had glowing masters on their spine and were struggling to pull themselves toward the control panel and access hatch. Their fellow slaves were trying to help them up, but still did not understand their desperation.

He could dimly hear the bridge and Andy yelling back and forth, but even their strident volume could not cut through the continuing ringing in his ears. Andy turned toward him and yelled, "They're going to..." and then all hell broke loose.

---------------------

"What the fuck was that?" Jim said, nearly dropping his helmet as a deafening "THUMP" echoed throughout the ship. "Did one of the other teams figure out how to get to the shaped charges?"

Wayne cocked his head and smiled. "No, son. That sounded..." Wayne paused as a half-dozen additional thumps followed in quick succession. "Those were launches," Wayne said approvingly. "I looked briefly at those systems and concluded the escape systems were locked down tight, but it looks like one of the teams figured something out."

Chen smiled, too, even as he nervously kept an eye on the corridor outside the quartermaster room. "Good on them... that's the first good news we've had since all this started! Do you think they'll be able to warn the fleet before they get intercepted, though?"

Wayne's smile turned into a grimace. "Judging from the direction of the sound, I'm pretty sure those were from the port side pods. If there was anyone in those capsules, I suspect they had a very, VERY short trip."

Chen's face fell. "Damn. So the fleet probably still won't know what's going on."

Jim shook his head. "Probably not; Still, hopefully all the pyrotechnics will warn the fleet that something is going on."

Wayne nodded. "If they're watching. Keep in mind that most of the fleet's sensors are pointed outward, so people might not notice that the real enemy is already behind their lines." Wayne finished putting on his leg armor and began attaching his chest plate. "Which is why we still need to get an actual message out, one way or another."

Chen handed Jim his combat gauntlets and a dummy sidearm. "Right," he said. "You still haven't explained how gearing up is supposed to help us do that. Even if you had actual weapons, you could never fight your way through that many troops."

Jim holstered his pistol and began adjusting the straps of his body armor. "Ah, young padawan. I got it when Wayne mentioned Star Wars."

Chen shook his head impatiently. "I don't really like classical video."

Wayne nodded as he finished putting on his armor and looked it over in the mirror. "There is wisdom to be found in history, son. They're trying to capture the remaining crew of the Bounteous. Well, unfortunately for you... Jim and I are going to help them do exactly that."

---------------------

Despite his earlier bravado, Wayne was honestly shocked at how well their "prisoner transfer" gambit was going. As Chen had warned, the halls were positively crawling with marine troopers and heavily-armed crew members (including several of their former crewmates who had joined the other side, he noted with barely-concealed disgust). But none of them had questioned or challenged the three of them as they frog-marched Chen through one of the cargo airlocks onto the Vanguard. "Out of the frying pan, into the fire," Wayne thought to himself.

Wayne suspected that part of their success could be attributed to Chen: Every time he glanced at him, he was impressed with how terrified and overwhelmed Chen looked. To anyone who looked at the trio, it seemed obvious that the two heavily-armed troopers were dragging the poor prisoner to his doom, rather than his salvation.

Paradoxically, the more enemy troopers Wayne saw on the Bounteous, the happier he was. If their security teams were all occupied mopping up the last of the resistance here, he hoped that the Vanguard's key systems would be lightly guarded. And once Wayne could figure out how to tap into their comms and disable the jamming system, they could finally warn the fleet. Wayne savored the irony of infiltrating the flagship and turning its systems against the invaders. Turnabout was fair play, as they say.

As the three free men exited one of the massive cargo airlocks connecting the two ships, Wayne allowed himself a brief moment of optimism. While there were still an intimidating number of hostiles in the staging area just outside the airlocks, they still seemed to be focused on organizing troopers and damage control teams, and not on checking up on his group. They had crossed about a third of the staging area when a voice behind them barked out, "Oy! Where are you taking him?"

Wayne tried to keep the panic out of his voice as he answered, "To sick bay, for processing."

The trooper behind him seemed to buy their answer, which relieved Wayne, but then helpfully responded, "Are you out? We'll take care of it!" and to Wayne's horror, pulled out a shockingly large knife, which he pointed at Chen, saying "Turn him around."

Chen turned pale as a sheet... but outnumbered as they were, Wayne and Jim had to comply, flipping Chen around so he faced the knife-wielding trooper. Without any preamble or warning, the trooper pressed the spine of the knife against the back of Chen's neck. Then in one swift motion, the trooper sliced through Chen's shirt, completely exposing his back. Chen gasped and shivered at the sudden exposure.

Wayne was relieved when the trooper put away his knife--maybe this was just some sort of inspection step?--but was immediately shocked when the trooper pulled out what looked like a folded GLOWING blue lamprey and pressed it against Chen's spine, where it began stretching and spreading downward until it entirely covered the shaking crewman's spine.

Wayne wanted to do something to help Chen as he shook and began to collapse, but it seemed like all he and Jim could do was hold him steady as Chen began to spasm even more wildly. Maybe he and Jim could still make a break and drag Chen along with them since they'd hopefully still have the element of surprise. Wayne tried to catch Jim's eye to signal him, but then Chen's shaking suddenly stopped and he stood perfectly still. Wayne looked at Chen's face for any sort of signal of what he could do to help him, and was shocked when Chen's head swiveled like a doll's and he announced in a calm, emotionless voice: "It's a trick. These men are not controlled."

Wayne didn't even have time to fully process Chen's betrayal before he let go and ran as fast as his legs could carry him. If he made it out of this open area and into the labyrinthine corridors of the Vanguard, he might just stand a chance. Jim apparently had the same idea and took off toward another exit.

Unfortunately, Wayne soon realized that his normal training regimen might not have been optimized for "running" as much as it had been for "fried snack foods" and "pointed sarcasm," and soon both he and Jim were back in the hands of the troopers. To their horror, as the soldiers stripped them of their armor and shirts, they saw Chen calmly approach them reverently holding one of the squirmy glowing creatures.

"Soon, you will understand," Chen said as he pressed the creature against Wayne's shivering back.

As the alien began digging its tendrils into his spine and his muscles tensed and then became unresponsive, Wayne began inventory all of the mistakes he had made that had led to this moment. If they had just started trying to cut into the armory when the Captain had gone silent, they could have finished in time to have weapons and explosives to defend the Bounteous. If they had focused on escaping the Bounteous before it was clear that they couldn't defend it, they could used the starboard escape capsules to warn the rest of the fleet. If they'd been able to scuttle the ship and break its back, the goddamn glowing aliens wouldn't be enslaving him and the rest of the crew and puppeting them to betray the rest of the fleet. But their biggest mistake...

Wayne felt all of the tension leave his body as he straightened up and looked around the staging areas with fresh, glowing eyes.

Chen reached out and grasped Wayne, saying "Welcome, brother."

Then Wayne realized his biggest mistake by far was not giving himself up to his new master sooner. And he would do everything he could to make sure that no other human in the fleet made the same mistake.