Chapter 14

Tuckered out

Tuck waited until the tremor faded before turning his attention to his two human companions.

"That happen often?" He asked.

The lanky red-headed fellow shook his head. "Nuthin' like that, guv."

Tuck thought about it for a few more moments before shaking his head. He'd be the first to admit that he wasn't the brightest fellow, but he felt that he made up for that with sheer determination. That was what pushed him through all the cooking classes, and that's what helped him focus on his goal.

"How are our friends?" Tuck asked the stocky blonde human. "Er, Dave?"

"David." The human replied, his tone terse.

"Right. Well?"

David sighed. "They're fine; breathing and heart-rates are normal."

"Sleeping like babies." The red-head said as he started working on the hatch console. "Best part is, when they wake up, they'll just think they fell asleep after enjoying lunch."

Tuck grimaced. While he knew drugging the stew was a great way for them to get into the room, he didn't like the idea of his cooking being altered.

"Oh, relax!" The red-head said, patting Tuck on the back without taking his eyes of the console. "It's only temporary; and hey, the enjoyed it, didn't they? Ate every last bit."

"Of course they did." Tuck grunted, allowing himself a moment of pride.

"A krogan chef." David said, shaking his head.

"Not just a krogan chef." The red-head said, "A good krogan chef. Ha!"

Tuck could only sigh at this. He understood their point; the krogan weren't exactly known for gourmet cooking. No, blowing things up was much more there game. It was only recently that Primarch Wrex expressed a desire in making an effort to bring culture to Tuchanka. It could've been worse, he supposed. He could've been the krogan sent to art school. Besides, he liked cooking.

Tuck's thoughts were interrupted when David said, "Uh, Fred? Not to rush ya, but these clowns aren't gonna be sleeping forever."

"Ease off, mate. This is tricky work 'ere. I get it wrong, and someone's gotta stay behind to work the hatch. Let me tell ya now, if that happens, it ain't gonna be me."

"It's a simple remote activation algorithm." David said, eyes narrowed at his friend. "It doesn't have to be pretty; just make it work."

"Yeah, and if they figure out I put it there, we're up shit creek. I gotta do it sneaky-like ... now stop buggin' me."

Fred waved a hand dismissively at David, who snorted and shook his head before turning to Tuck. "So. Bounty hunter, huh?"

"Bah. Not for over a decade." Tuck said. "Dangerous work; never cared for it, really."

"Really? Sounds like fairly easy money if you're a good shot."

Tuck shook his head. "Need more than that, Dave. Gotta be a good tracker to find 'em, gotta be a good pilot to chase 'em down, gotta have a hell of an eye to make sure you've got the right mark, and you've got to be a good medic for those times when you need 'em alive but are forced to drop 'em to bring 'em in. If that ain't enough, then you gotta be on the lookout for friends and family looking for retribution. Like, forever. If that ain't bad enough, you've got te be an exceptional negotiator; you wouldn't believe how hard it is to get even a reputable employer to pay the incurred tax, not to mention expenses."

The look on David's face was priceless. Shaking his head, David said, "Forget I said anything."

One of the soldiers slumped against the wall began to stir.

"Uh, guys?" David said.

Tuck raised a hand. "Fred?"

Fred tapped rapidly at the controls for a few more seconds before nodded. "Good to go."

"All right." Tuck pulled a small vial from one of his pouches and knelt by the fallen guards. Careful to open the vial away from his own face, he then proceeded to wave it under the nose of the soldier.

The soldier's eyes flew open. Clutching his nose as though it were on fire, the poor fellow let out a strangled yell.

"Oy!" Tuck said, smiling at the fellow and clapping him on the shoulder. "There you are! As good as new."

"What ... what happened?" the soldier said, eyes darting from Tuck to David and Fred. His hand went to his holster, where his gun was still safely stored.

"Easy there." Tuck said, hoisting the solder to his feet. "Sorry about that, Lieutenant. I guess I went a little overboard with the spacum in that batch of stew. Don't worry; most people have a slight allergic reaction to it in large doses. Your head should clear up in a few minutes."

"R-right." The soldier said. "Did ... did we recieve any commands?"

"Nope." David said. "Everything's been quiet."

"Good." Shaking his head, the soldier shakily approached his console. Tuck waved the vial under the other two guards with practiced ease, his other hand going for the stun pistol under his apron in case the lieutenant noticed Fred's handiwork.

The lieutenant breathed a sigh of relief. "No alerts. That's a relief."

"I'm really sorry." Tuck said, pretending to be bashful. "Silly mistake on my part. Still, no harm no foul, eh?"

"It was a good stew." The soldier admitted. "I've never seen someone mix pineapple and beef."

"Tasty, right?" Tuck chuckled and patted the soldier's shoulder. "I'll make sure to tell your usual cooks here to lay off the spacum in the future; should prevent any other accidental knock-outs. Or hell; make it as is for anyone with insomnia. One way to get some sleep, eh?"

The lieutenant let out a laugh as Tuck patted him good-naturedly on the shoulder. Fred and David helped the other two soldiers as Tuck headed for the door, reclaiming his pot and ladle along the way. The other soldiers were a bit shaken, but seemed no worse for wear.

Just as Tuck reached for the door control panel, the lieutenant's control panel started beeping loudly.

Tuck, Fred, and David froze in place as the soldiers quickly moved to their posts. Tuck was certain they'd been found out until the lieutenant said, "Proximity alert; incoming ship."

"Outgoing?" One of the other soldiers asked.

The lieutenant shook his head. "Incoming. Someone's approaching from outside. Small ship, three life-signs."

"Is it a threat?"

The lieutenant gave him a look. "Hardly. Shields are barely functioning and there are no weapon systems. Looks like a small transport shuttle or a large escape pod."

"And they're coming toward us?" The soldier shook his head. "Not the brightest, are they? Well, bright or not, I'll have 'em in three ... two ... got 'em."

The lieutenant nodded after a few moments. "Nice shot. Bringing them to Hangar C-9."

"Hold on." said the soldier who had thus far remained silent. "There's a radiation leak in C-9."

"Understood. Redirect it to storage hangar G-3. Alert security and tell them to hurry or there won't be anything left to interrogate."

The lieutenant glanced back at Tuck, David, and Fred. "Is something wrong?"

"Huh? Oh, nah. Just makin' sure I didn't leave nuthin'." Tuck tapped the ladle to his head in an impromptu salute. "Carry on fighting the good fight."

Once they were outside and away from any members of Cerberus they could see, David said, "That's where our ship was stored."

"You sure?" Tuck asked, even though he had a pretty good feeling he knew the answer.

"I'm the one who dug through the system and found the damn thing. What did they mean by 'nothing left to interrogate?"

"Somethin' tells me Nella and yer friends are gonna find out." Fred shook his head. "A shame; I think Nella was sweet on me."

"She shot at you." David said, a look of disbelief on his face, to which Fred just shrugged.

"Yeah, but in a playful kinda way." He gave his friend a goofy smile. David responded by rolling his eyes and turning back to Tuck.

"What do we do?"

Tuck snorted. "We go help, of course."

"But we aren't even armed!" David said. "What are we gonna do, yell at ... whatever the hell's in there?"

Tuck sighed, but he knew the man had a point. "All right, tell you what; you two go back and fill Shavan and Blessia in on the plan. I'll go to G-3 and see if I can't help sort out whatever mess they've gotten into."

"Screw that, man." Fred said even as David nodded in agreement. "I ain't runnin' from a good scrap and I don't need no fancy weapons; just gimmie the ladle, that'll suffice."

Tuck stared at him wordlessly for a few moments before asking, "Before this whole mess, you were the ship's cook, weren't you?"

Fred grinned. "Repairman."

Glen sent three skrievers skittering away with a punch that left a dent in the metal floor of the hangar bay. Despite the greater strength Headache provided, she was used to fighting opponents her size or bigger.

"Ugh." She said, shaking her head. "I knew it wouldn't be easy, but Glyche? Here? By the Creator."

"Glyche?" Eri asked, as he blasted one of the insect-like robots into scrap metal. Behind him, Xyn sent a few flying with a wave of her hand, the Neukaran magic more than a match for the small bots.

"It would take way too long to explain." Glen ducked just as a skriever leapt at her, energy blade narrowly missing her neck by less than an inch.

Nella slapped a fresh heat sink into her pistol. "All right; how do we deal with this?"

"Like we're already doing." Glen said before dodging another airborne skriever and backhanding it with enough force to send it smashing against the bulkhead of a krogan shuttle.

"We could take cover in the ship-" Eri said.

"-At which point they'd slice it into little bits to get the creamy center ... the creamy center being us. Think things through, Eri."

Eri blasted two skrievers in mid-air before smashing a third with the butt of his rifle. "You sound like my mother."

Glen sent another leaping Glyche, using Headache's energy shield to hit the little robot away like a tennis ball. "Look, just keep shooting; there can't be an indefinite number of these things."

"How do you know?" Eri asked

"Like I said, I'll tell ya all about the Glyche later. Right now, just keep firing and try not to get diced!"

"Sure thing, Mom."

Glen shot a glare at Eri before turning her attention on the next batch of skrievers, only for the bug-like machines to suddenly scurry away.

A quick glance around the immediate area showed all of the skrievers suddenly in retreat. In a matter of moments, they were alone in the hangar.

"Uh, yeah." Glen said, unable to quash a note of uncertainty in her voice. "And stay out!"

Eri, however, didn't relax in the slightest. "I don't like this."

"I hear ya." Glen said. "Everyone stay alert. Speaking of alert, you okay, Xyn?"

When Xyn didn't respond, Glen looked around and found the Neukaran gone. "Son of a ..." Smacking Eri in the arm, Glen said, "You were supposed to be watching her!"

"Huh? She's ..." Eri's eyes went wide when he realized that she was not in fact right behind him. "By the ... Xyn! Xyn, honey, where are you?"

"Be careful." Glen said as Eri hurried away in search of his love. "It ain't like skrievers to just give up like that ... and for the love of the Creator, stay focused!"

"Right." With a bob of his head in Glen's direction, Eri jogged into the crowded hangar and was soon out of sight.

Glen turned back to Nella only to find the asari smirking at her.

"What?" Glen asked a bit testily.

"Well-oiled machine, this." Nella said, still smirking.

Rolling her eyes, Glen said, "All right, let's get moving; the sooner we get to your ship, the safer I'll feel."

They hurried to the entry ramp of the Centurion Hawk and entered the ship cautiously. They needn't have bothered; the ship was empty.

"Nice place." Glen said as they moved through the ship toward the bridge.

"Should be." Nella said. "Dave treats her like his baby. Broke his heart when she was dragged into this monstrosity."

It was a comfortable little ship, the sort of vessel smugglers and cargo runners alike preferred due to the large amount of compartments both hidden and otherwise.

As they entered the bridge area, Glen commented, "I always wanted a ship like this."

"Can't say I'm surprised." Nella said. "You strike me as the type."

"Oh?" Glen asked, raising an eyebrow at the asari. "And what type might that be?"

"Scoundrel. Troublemaker. The kind of attitude that only follows the rules when they can't find a way around them. Perfect attitude for a smuggler."

"I never said anything about smuggling."

"You didn't have to. Mum always told me that even straight-laced cargo runners have to have a bit of smuggler in them. Ya pretty much have to these days, especially if you're runnin' through the Terminus Systems. Can't bend the rules, and you might as well jettison your cargo out into space."

Glen couldn't help but grin; Nella was right, of course, but bending the rules took on a whole new meaning when Glen was involved. She scratched the back of her rune hand, the Anti-ka Maru glowing slightly in response.

Several loud clanks made Nella and Glen look up.

"What was that?" Glen asked.

"Gimmie a sec." After a few moments, Nella said, "Huh. Looks like we got a ship incoming."

"Cerberus?"

Nella shook her head. "Scanners say it's an old Batarian ship; looks like a converted troop transport to me. You see a lot of those around the Terminus systems."

"Okay, but what is it doing in Artemis Tau?" Glen asked.

Nella gave him an odd look. "Artemis Tau?"

"That's what I said." Glen said, a hint of exasperation in her voice. "I mean, there's nothing out here but Cerberus's little base. We at least were looking for it."

"What does that have to do with Artemis Tau?" Nella asked, sounding more than a little confused. "We're in Sigurd's Cradle."

Now it was Glen who looked confused. "No, we definitely snuck on board in Artemis Tau."

"Well, I'm not sure what to tell ya." Nella said, "We were delivering supplies to Sanctum when we got picked up. Two of their bigger ships just jumped in and brought us to their little sun base."

Glen and Nella stared at each other for a long moment. Indeed, it was the appearance of the ship in question that broke them from their thoughts.

"Holy hell." Glen said, "Look at the scoring on the underside of the hull. Looks like they had a rough time of it. Have you seen that kind of damage before?"

"Yeah, actually. We use magnetized crates to keep cargo from gettin' tossed around. When the coils start going, the crate's will sometimes scrape along the cargo bay. Makes a hell of a racket, and the scraped sides of the crates kinda look like that, though maybe not so bad."

They watched as the ship was placed in the center of the hangar. A massive cage surrounded the ship, effectively sealing the ship's passengers inside.

After staring at the ship on Nella's screen for a few moments, Glen said, "I gotta know who's in there."

"I'm with you." Nella said, rising from her chair.

"No offence, Nell, but you need to stay and get the ship ready to go; if what you told me is true, I think we're gonna be wanting to get outta here in a hurry."

"If it's true?"

"Like I said, no offence." Glen said, giving Nella a kind smile. "Besides, I'm just indulging curiosity, is all. Lock the ramp behind me, and keep an eye out for the others. Oh, and if Eri and Xyn show up, make sure they stay here; the last thing I need is to have to go chasing them down at the last minute."

"Glen!" Nella called out as Glen headed for the ramp. When Glen turned, Nella just sighed and shook her head. "I was gonna ask you to not do anything stupid, but I can tell that's a waste of breath. Just try not to blow up this place until I secure our way outta here, okay?"