As the rest of the crew cheered and headed for the makeshift airlock, Widow and Whittaker held back. They gave each other a terse look of understanding, and Widow signed. Follow me.

Whittaker nodded, and the two followed the rest of the crew through the airlock.

The hallway pressurized, and the crew started to shed their helmets, laughing and jostling about. Widow started giving commands inside their own helmet. “Dryad, give me some projections on how long rations and hydroponics can sustain us. Also, figure out bunk assignments, shift rotations, and operating logistics. Assume we only have the crew in hallway section two, for now.”

“Confirmed. Beginning analysis.”

“Thanks, Dryad.”

The hallway door slid open, and the crew quickly spread out into the waiting empty space. Ugh. Trying to reign them in would be a nightmare. Unfortunately, Widow had even more pressing issues at hand. With a wave of their hand, they led Whittaker into a small office a few turns away. The two unsealed their helmets.

Whittaker was a tall, muscular, and scarred man, and he towered over Widow’s lithe frame. When he spoke, it was a deep, raspy bass. “You’re no fleet commander. And even if you were, if I found you hiding like a coward out on this moon, I’d kill you myself for desertion.”

Widow gauged their odds for a moment. “No, I’m not. But I am your best shot for survival, and for your crew. I’ve spent more than a year here doing fuck-all except prepare for the Affini. Rank doesn’t matter anymore.”

“So then what are you?”

“I just told you that rank doesn’t—” there was a blur of motion, and a moment later, Widow and Whittaker had handguns to each other’s skulls.

“Bullshit. I didn’t spend a year out fighting Affini to come find you sitting pretty in a little secret bunker. Who the fuck are you?”

“I didn’t get blown up on a dark-ops mission and drag myself back from the dead to have you question my expertise. This is my moon, my base, and I don’t give a flying fuck about your chain of command.”

Whittaker’s eyes narrowed. “You’re an intelligence brat, aren’t you. OCNI.”

“Only took you half a century. How’s your captain’s chair feeling now, all tangled up in vines?” Widow replied with a sneer.

Whittaker’s lip curled, but he lowered his gun. Widow matched it.

“Look. I’ve never liked you Navy brass types and I’m not starting today. Luckily for both of us, we don’t need to like each other to help each other.”

“The feeling’s mutual, but I agree. What do you propose?” Whittaker holstered his gun and crossed his arms.

“I need information and your command,” Widow started, holding up two fingers. “First, information. I crashed here more than a standard year ago and I haven’t turned my comms array on in just as long. I need details, and more than just ‘we lost’. Give me the rundown on everything. Timeline, locations, current situation. Affini weaknesses would be a great help, too.

“Second, command. I couldn’t reign in your crew even if I wanted to, but I know this base and this moon better than anyone. So I’ll lead, you command, and we pretend everything’s smooth until we can go our separate ways. Deal?”

“Hrm.” Whittaker frowned. “Deal.”

“I had the base AI assign bunks and allocate resources. I’ll get reports from the medical bay soon. Until then, can you get your crew in line? We’re going to need more than one success to get out of this.”

Whittaker nodded. “On that, we agree.”

“Dryad, put Captain Whittaker into the command structure. Standard procedure.”

The AI’s smooth voice replied a moment later. “Confirmed. Captain Whittaker, please state your name and command code.”

Nodding, satisfied, Widow turned away. “I’ll be in the command room. Keep your men from destroying the place, would you? After that’s settled, we can talk more.”

They didn’t wait for a response before leaving the office, sorting through the dozens of notifications Dryad had pushed to their visor. Bunker structural integrity was good, but they had lost critical ground in the elevator and the main entrance. The second section of hallway would have to do for an airlock. Medical projections were good — the New Ironstone had brought with them multiple medics, and even with Vulkan’s limited stores, the wounded were being tended to. Resource analysis was… tight, to say the least. They could swing it, but the base had been left with little in the way of food storage, and the hydroponics could only put out so much. Still, there was a good chance they wouldn’t need it anyway. The Affini weren’t going anywhere, that much was for sure.

Widow sighed. They needed a plan. The flamethrowers had worked well, but the fuel was a precious and limited resource. The Affini weren’t affected by vacuum, they had wildly superior technology and ships, and by now they were surely watching the bunker entrance like starhawks. Things were about to get very, very unpleasant.

The executive command of the Leuteria stood around a woven table, deep in discussion. A holographic projection of the Vulkan bunker rotated slowly in the center.

“Let’s review the schematics again. Can we breach with class-Z?”

“The air-conditioning systems are all deep underground, tied up in the subterranean terraforming. We’d need to excavate for it.”

“We don’t have the equipment for a mining operation of that scale and fidelity.”

“Well, going in through the front is a death sentence. We’re lucky we got out as cleanly as we did.”

“And… we’re back to the growing beds.”

The discussion quieted. They’d reached this stalemate a dozen times now. Eventually, Cynthus Tey, Second Bloom spoke up hesitantly. “Well… they cannot leave. The bunker only has one way in and one way out. Many of these Terran blacksites were designed as such, trusting that they could resist capture for long enough for help to arrive. We could simply… wait them out.”

The discussion paused, an uncomfortable silence falling over the table. Illana spoke up first. “Out of the question.”

“With all due respect, I do not see any other—”

“Absolutely not! We will not stand idly by while sophonts suffer beneath us. I’m shocked you would even suggest such a callous course of inaction! To starve them out? Do you truly think that acceptable?”

“If it means we can—”

“That’s enough, Tey.” Thern’s voice was quiet, but carried an unmistakably dangerous undertone. “We will find another way. That is final.”

“I—” the systems engineer faltered, yellow blooms rippling uncertainly. “Yes, Captain.”

After a moment, they spoke again. “She does bring up a good point, however. The Terrans have nowhere to go. They are trapped in their own fortress. We can flood the bunker with class-Z from the entrance. Use one of our transports to seal the gap, so we will not be exposing ourselves to unnecessary danger. That way, we can avoid depressurizing them, as well.”

“How do we secure the rest of the bunker? The doors will certainly be sealed, and if they see us preparing, they’ll all have masks and weapons.” Illana sat back, unconvinced. “I am all for effective domestication, but I will not put my team into reblooming beds.”

“Tey,” Thern said, their voice carrying an ever-so-slightly softer tone. “You have broken Terran Intelligence systems before. I assume it would be no trouble of yours to gain control over the bunker’s artificial intelligence?”

“If I can communicate with it. This bunker has been offline for more than a year. We don’t know if their communications are even intact, and I can’t gain access if I can’t get a data burst to land.”

Barrik smiled. “Oh, I’m sure that will be no trouble. Our little weaver was hiding, being very careful not to send any signals. There’s no more sense in keeping their communications down. Keep a vine on it, Tey. Once you have access, we’ll begin. Now, everyone else…”

Leigh sat on their bunk, utterly exhausted. As much as Widow hated to admit it, they weren’t used to operating at full throttle. There was a peaceful rhythm to solitary life on the bunker, even in the conditioning and the training. That had all gone out the window with the arrival of New Ironstone. They missed their afternoons out with Emi, the quiet contemplation, the looking out at the stars.

Still, they had work to do. They stepped out of bed, unplugging their Ariadne suit from the wall. It was too risky to live without it — even a breath of Affini knockout gas meant game over, and that was assuming they even stayed in a pressurized zone. Much better to keep it close at hand.

After getting dressed, Leigh passed by their room’s computer terminal, swiping away a heavily-abbreviated history of Terran space since their mission. For some reason, all the information was dumbed down so badly it was nearly unreadable, but Captain Whittaker had confirmed that the essence of it was true. A series of defeats, followed by immediate fleet capitulation on Terra, and the New Ironstone had been on the run ever since. There were rumors of jump drive explosions, suicide runs, and the occasional jailbreak on the net, but far from anything that could make up an actual grand strategy. Like it or not, Terra was lost.

Leigh huffed. They’d barely slept, and despite a single small victory, everything else had been bad news. They’d had to open the communications array to avoid a riot, every prediction from Dryad was getting less hopeful by the hour, and the sensors showed that the Affini were just sitting there.

Frustrated, Leigh powered down the terminal. They’d get breakfast first. As long as the Affini were just waiting, there wasn’t much use in rushing. Maybe an idea would come to them while they were eating.

With their helmet under their arm, Leigh headed for the mess hall. As they walked, they caught whispers, glances thrown their way, and muttered curses from crew going about their newly-assigned tasks. What the hell? It seems there are enemies without and within. Be on guard. Leigh sighed. Just another thing to keep track of.

The door to the mess hall slid open, and Widow paused. They’d never seen the room staffed, or, well, populated. After a moment’s hesitation, they headed for a small food dispensary and grabbed a few nutritional bars and water bottle.

“Sixteen credits have been charged to your account,” chirped the kiosk. “Thank you for using One-Stop Vending!”

“Oh, go to hell,” they replied, shooting the thing a withering glare. They knew turning the communications back on had been a mistake. Now the whole damn base would try to charge them to pay back some company that no longer existed.

They sat at one of the many tables, chewing through their ration while their helmet sat beside them. Again, the whispers started to reach their ears.

“…an intelligence officer…”

“…part of that… raid…”

Perhaps our status as unlicensed commander has been leaked. Yeah, no shit. Leigh ignored them. They could whisper all they wanted, as long as they kept up with their jobs. Ugh. The nutritional bar had the consistency of moon dust and none of the flavor. Good for calories, Widow thought sarcastically. They sipped on their water.

“Okay, I’ve heard enough!” Widow looked up as a crew member — a gunner, maybe — stood up from his group and stormed over to Widow. “Commander, are ya? Well, bullshit! You’ve got no right to lead us, or this bunker! You ain’t even Navy! You’re a damn spy!” He was standing above Widow, now, and turned to address the loose group that was forming. “We can’t trust ‘im! What, this savior comes out of a hole in the ground and brings us in? More likely he’s working with the weeds outside! Hell, they could be knocking on the doors right now! What are we waiting for? This bastard to give us orders? I don’t think so! We report to the Captain, not some mole!”

Slowly, delicately, Widow retrieved their pistol from its holster. Things were going very wrong, very quickly, and they needed to regain control. The gunner kept yelling, and the crew was listening.

“Now what I say, is we take this corpo-rat, and we throw him out the—”

Bang!

The report of the pistol echoed throughout the mess hall, and the gunner dropped to the ground, clutching his now-burst eardrums.

“You listen to me!” Widow shouted. “We’re all on the same side here, and I am not going to tolerate insubordination! You have your orders from your captain and you have them from me, understand? And if you want to question that, you can try your luck outside!”

The crowd shifted restlessly. It’s not going to be enough. The entire room was a powder keg on a razor’s edge, and anything could upset the tension. Another one of the crew stepped forward, raising his fists.

“That’s enough! Stand down!” the booming voice of Captain Whittaker echoed through the mess hall. Instantly, the crowd started to disperse, shifting away from one another in the face of the order. “We are all very fortunate to have found this bunker, and we will respect the…” he gave Widow a knowing, almost mocking look. “Commander of it. If you take issue with orders Commander Howells has given, you may take it up with me. Are we clear?”

There was a scattered murmur of assent.

“I said, are we clear?”

“Yes, sir!”

“Good! Now get moving!”

The crowd dispersed, leaving Widow and Whittaker alone in the center of the room. The captain smirked again before turning on his heel and walking out of the hall.

Widow scowled at the retreating figure. Motherfucker.

They grabbed their helmet off the table, sealing it to their suit, and glanced through the ever-growing list of notifications. Hell. They didn’t have time for this. Still fuming, they headed for the hydroponics systems. Maybe working away from other humans would help.

The crew ignored them, thankfully, as they left the mess hall. A few minutes later, they were deep in the rows of tanks that would, hopefully, feed the bunker. Leigh spent a few more minutes checking water conditions and growth values in each tank before circling back around to the console. It’s not going to be enough. They recorded the values before tapping their helmet.

“Dryad, send me those updated productivity reports. I want to know how long we can last if they try to starve us out.”

“Sure thing!” The response was… informal, chipper, even. Widow frowned. That was wrong. It’s time. The attack is imminent.

“Everybody, helmets on, now! Red alert!” Widow shouted into their communicator. No response. Oh, not good. The door behind Widow opened, and they turned to see a tidal wave of pink gas rushing through the air before the lights went out.

Things were falling apart. The bunker, which had once been an impenetrable fortress, had quickly become the anvil that the Affini were breaking the resistance against. Dryad was offline, along with all intrabase communications. The subnet connection was down, and while power and life-support was holding steady, lights flickered uncertainly and the bunker had been completely flooded with knockout gas. Unconscious bodies were strewn about the bunker, many curled up and snoring with gas masks just out of reach. Widow crept through the hallways, helmet on full sensory amplification. Fighting was futile, which left running and hiding as their only options. They’d escaped once before, after all.

Fortunately, the hydroponics systems were near the far back of the base. That gave Widow plenty of time to formulate and execute a plan. Unfortunately, the base was rapidly falling under Affini control, and there was only one exit. They would have to move quickly if they had any chance at slipping through the cracks. In the distance, bursts of gunfire echoed through the hallways. Best to avoid active combat if they could.

Their suit’s active camouflage blended in beautifully with the dark greys and shifting lights within the base. It wouldn’t hold up to scrutiny, but hopefully it would be enough to avoid capture. If not, well.. death before capture. Right.

Widow slunk though the hallways, checking the cross-angles as they moved toward the base entrance. Slow is smooth. Smooth is fast. In fluid, well-rehearsed motions, Widow became little more than a small distortion in the air, a ghost cutting through the pale pink mist as it settled across the base. They paused at an intersection as a prickle ran across their skin. There. The telltale slither-slide of vine on vine and metal reached Widow’s ears, even as faint as it was. Between them and the secondary causeway. Server rack, maintenance room, or service alleyway. Headed this way.

Widow continued forward, slipping into an engineering lab-turned-armory. A few crew members were slumped over workstations — it seemed that the rush of knockout gas had hit them before they had a chance to even go for isolation suits. It was too late for them, now. Widow passed them by, finding a small, cluttered corner of the room. Delicately, they activated the magnets in their boots and gloves, swinging themselves up off the ground and settling against the wall. Their camouflage adapted quickly, and moments later, they were nearly invisible — only the faintest line between their body and the wall could give them away. The Affini drew closer, and Widow watched the door, breathing slowly.

There. The alien was massive, taking up the entire doorway and casting a shadow across the lab. Though its upper body was humanoid, its lower half dissolved into a rolling storm of vines, lashing on the ground, curling around the doorframe, and creeping into the room. It held up one hand, and a bright blue light poured out from a sunflower-shaped bloom on its arm. Dozens of other, smaller flowers shone, casting the entire Affini in an otherworldly glow. It scanned the room, glancing over the unconscious Terrans, then chuckled to itself. It fished some device out of its leg, and spoke in an odd, airy, resonant register unlike anything Widow had ever heard. The device—a communicator— replied, and the Affini started to gather up the crew, wrapping them in vines and pulling them through the air. Widow watched, breathless, as the Affini brought all the crew together, then swung its light about to check the room again. It felt like an eternity as the spotlight swept across the room, even lingering on Widow, hidden in plain sight, for a moment.

Then, the Affini flowed out of the room, bringing the bundled captives with. Widow let out a silent breath. The sound of vines receded, and Widow delicately let themselves back down. They followed the Affini’s path back towards the front of the base, keeping eyes and ears at the ready. Secondary causeway. Server rack. Maintenance room. Check the cross-angle. Clear. Move.

Another burst of gunfire erupted, accompanied by the splatter-hiss of napalm on metal. Evidently, there was still some resistance holding up. Widow crept around the corner, gazing down the small connecting corridor that linked the larger arteries of the base. In the adjacent hallway, the floor and walls were warped and scorched, with metal slag dripping and pooling as smoke choked the area. An Affini stood between Widow and the hellhole, its leaves singed but still very much alive. Get to the hallway and turn right. The exit is just beyond. Dutifully, Widow started to move forward, keeping low to the ground as they approached.

The gunfire paused, and the smoke cleared just enough for Widow to make out the remaining fighters. There was Whittaker, deftly loading new napalm into a flamethrower. Two other crew stood behind him, wielding projectile rifles that probably weren’t going to be much good. The Affini bristled, and a cloud of gas rippled off its body, pulsing through the air and cloaking its body.

“Open fire!” even with the comms down, Widow could hear Whittaker’s command and the telltale clack of rifle actions. Immediately, the Affini burst into a loose tangle of vines, acting with inhuman speed as it dodged and wove around the incoming gunfire. In a blink, it had crossed the distance, and spiked vines wrapped around the struggling Terrans. Game over. There was an ache in Widow’s arm, near their shoulder. We’ve been hit. Huh?

The operative looked down, where a bloom of blood was starting to spread across their shoulder. Their camouflage faltered, and when Widow looked up again, Whittaker was looking directly at them. His helmet was off, and gas was curling around his nose, but he was maintaining some semblance of consciousness for now. He jerked his head weakly, his eyes drooping shut. Widow got the message. Get going.

They clutched their arm, active camo rippling back to full functionality. The wound was minor, a bullet must have just grazed them in the skirmish. Still, not good. They crept around the corner, desperately hoping the Affini wouldn’t turn around and spot them immediately. Crouch, step, slide. You’re clear. Go. They were moving quickly again — an arm injury hardly slowed their ability to move quietly, and the situation was dire. They turned into the main causeway, pressing themselves up against the wall. The lights were fully off, here, and they breathed a sigh of relief. Slowly, delicately, they started to creep forward. As they approached the exit, though, something is wrong. Widow scrambled to figure out the problem. The exit was just there, they just needed to reach the elevator shaft— this hallway was under vacuum. It isn’t now. Something has sealed the gap. Widow looked forward, peering into the darkness. The elevator entrance was still shredded. They took another hesitant step forward.

A laugh reached Widow’s ears, and the luminescent Affini from the armory dropped down from the elevator shaft. It was saying something, presumably to another Affini above them, when it stopped and looked at Widow curiously. No, not at them. Through them. Widow barely registered the presence of another Affini behind them, and by then, it was far too late. They were hoisted off the ground, with a vine wrapped around their neck. Widow’s rifle was ripped off their back and tossed aside, clattering as their hands rushed to the chokehold and they writhed in the air. Thorns prickled into their neck, drawing blood and sending off warnings of Isolation Suit Breach running through their visor and brain.

“There you are, little weaver,” hissed the Affini into Widow’s ear. “What, you thought you could hide from me?” It pulled Widow around, dragging them up face-to-face with the monster.

Its face was made up of dozens of dark wooden plates, carefully locked together to form an expressive mimicry of a human’s. Behind that, though, pitch-black vines were lashed together by barbed thorns, laced together into a tight weave of textured skin bristling with spikes. It only got worse as Widow looked on — the creature’s mouth was a gaping maw of needle-like spines, bristling and dripping with some darkly-shining liquid. Its eyes sparkled like gold flecks in wells of oil, glittering in the dim overhead lights. In another time, maybe it would have been beautiful, comforting even — but now, Widow was just filled with sheer, unabated terror. How long had it been following them?

“Finally.” Thern held up their prize with glee, watching as it squirmed helplessly in their grasp. “I’ve made plenty of mistakes with you, little Terran. I don’t intend to make any more. You are going to become a truly lovely toy.”

Widow couldn’t breathe. Their vision was collapsing, darkness rushing in as their hands lost power, dropping to hang limply at their sides. Red-alerts blared across their visor as they lost consciousness.

“…but that can wait. For now…”

Widow felt a rush of cool flood from their neck out through their body, and promptly blacked out.