Chapter XVIII

I step silently into the room. Carefully placing every step with care. My eyes scan the room; the bitchy captain is nowhere in sight.

Behind me I hear the faintest gasp. Gotcha. No doubt her recent and healing wounds are causing a bit of discomfort as she attempts to sneak up on me.

A nearly silent grunt and I can feel movement behind me. Years of training have left me completely aware of every movement in my vicinity. Quickly I turn around and grasp the foot that was about to make contact with my head. With a sharp twist her body spirals and lands with a thud.

She cries out in pain and clutches at her wounds. She's a good fighter. I'll give her that at least. However I am better. I toy with her a little. We grapple back and forth I allow her to land a few punches, she's pretty strong but I've fought far stronger people. I give her the glint of hope; maybe just maybe she could be winning. But no. I just actually wanted a semi-decent fight on this mission. She does put up a good fight, however I know I will ultimately come the victor.

When I grow tired of the game I'm playing with her I push a few points and she falls into unconsciousness. I grab a few ropes and secure her hands and feet.

I glide victoriously over to the control panels and I preset the coordinates into the autopilot. I crawl underneath and I know a mischievous glint is shining in my eyes. An excited hum rushes through my veins, I love making a muck up of a machine's inner workings. I cross a bunch of wires and disconnect a few very important cables. Even if they were able to free themselves there ain't no way that they could figure out this mess in time to make a difference. Oh sweet victory.

The boss is going to be very pleased. I fire up the transmitter and dial out the code.

"Hello."

"Hey boss." I chirp.

"Is everything going according to plan?"

"It's all set boss. Don't you worry."

With a curt nod the screen goes blank. A low moan sounds from behind me. The captain is waking up.

"What the hell?" I hear her grumble into the floor. "What is goin' on?" She exclaims, coming to greater realization.

I fix her with a malicious grin.

"Damn it! Tell me what the hell you are doin' on my ship!" Well I might as well. She isn't getting out of those bindings anytime soon.

"Well you see you'll be travelling down a path I've set, with no hope of changing course. Then you'll find yourselves trapped in a net. It's a machine that will hold the ship and pump gas into your ship's atmo. You'll feel a bit woozy then you won't feel anything. Then Cato can do whatever he wishes cause my job is done. I'm pretty sure he plans to just kill you. I don't know what you did to piss off Cato…but I gotta say…I sure as hell am glad I ain't you right now." I crouch in front of her as I speak. Her hateful glare is almost amusing.

She smirks, despite what I've just told her. "Well I sure as hell don't want to be you either."

My brow knits together in confusion and I cock my head to the side. What does she mean?

A sharp and sudden pain in my shoulder grabs my attention. I look over…a needle. A creamy skinned hand is holding it steady and pushing down the plunger. The edges of my vision start to glow. Soon everything takes on a weirdly shiny look. I can feel my muscles quickly loosing any semblance of control. I fall sideways from my crouched position and my body lands with a distant thump on the ground. No matter how hard I try to focus my eyes it just won't work. Finally, after long moments of this torturous confusion the shininess fades to black.

…:::…

My head feels heavy and foggy when the blackness starts to dissipate. I can feel the cool metal of a chair on my back and under me. I can feel to chafing of ropes on my limbs, binding them uncomfortably to the chair. Shit. I open my eyes to find the captain and the doctor standing and staring at me.

"We tried to fix the mess you made. You sure did a good job."

"It's a masterful piece of work!" I hear the chipper exclamations of the ditzy pilot. Followed by a feminine growl that vaguely resembles 'shut up Annie.'

I turn my head to see two sets of feet poking out from under the console. The gorgeous god of a man, Finnick, is crouched nearby holding an array of tools. My 'husband' leans against the wall nearby and scowls. It's a shame. He really is handsome... I really would have liked to give him a try. Oh well! For some unknown reason he's in love with that spiteful shrew of a mechanic. Pathetic really…the whole lot of them. Completely controlled by their emotions.

"Where are we going?" The captain demands. "How far away is this net exactly?"

"Not long now. I had planned to get off this piece of junk before that…" My voice trails off in realization. Ficken! Now I'm trapped on this god-forsaken boat with the rest of them. Cato thinks I'm already off the boat. He's going to kill everyone on board…which now includes me.

"You were planning on that…well it seems plans are changin' oh sweet wife of mine." Gale grumbles and growls. What a brainless oaf but at least he's pretty.

"We won't untie you. You said we were headed to a net. Where Cato would be waitin' to kill us. Now you are stuck on this boat with us. You'll die too. You know that. I saw you come to that realization. Now you are good with self-preservation and I can tell you are desperately tryin' to come up with a way to get yerself out of this mess. But you won't. If we go down, you bet yer ass you are goin' down with us. So I'd start thinkin' real hard about this, do you really think this is worth dyin' for?" Finnick's smooth voice is charming and persuasive.

He's right of course. I'm not entirely sure I want to die now…yes I'm really sure I don't. Either way I won't get paid because if they die then I die, but if they live then Cato won't pay me. I'm actually fairly certain he'll kill me for my failure. He isn't a man in control anymore, no something about this crew broke him, drove him insane. I know the feeling…even the short amount of time I've spent with them is enough to give me a permanent headache. Really I'm screwed either way. Damn it! Where did I go wrong? I know…it's that damn doctor. I underestimated him. I thought he'd be in the captain's bunk but he wasn't. He must've been on the bridge with her as I had started my rounds and somehow he avoided me. I'll bet he heard the mechanic and all her cursing. I'll bet he went to her and she told him I was an imposter. Then he snuck himself down to his stupid infirmary and grabbed some fancy medicine and came to rescue his 'lover.' Ugh. I was so close! I allowed myself to get cocky, what a rookie mistake!

"Fine. I'll tell you how to escape the net. But you gotta promise me something…somebody has to kill Cato. He'll kill all of us, me included and I just don't fancy dying anytime soon."

And so I do. To save my own skin I help them rewire their ship and reprogram the coordinates. I'm not going to think of this as giving up. No, rather that I can be bought by the highest bidder. Cato is offering money, however right now this crew determines whether I live or die, which makes them the highest bidder. They never completely untie me…apparently I can't be trusted. I guess I've earned that.

When they finally have control again I can see the net not far away. It really was a close one. A nagging in the back of my mind is smug knowing that if I hadn't completely wrecked this mission that there is no way they could have figured all that out on their own, at least not in time. At least I got one part right.

I gaze out into the blackness and see the small station attached to the net. I know Cato is waiting there. He's probably about to jump out of his own skin, I wouldn't doubt he is that excited. When he came to me and hired me I knew he wasn't in his right mind anymore. No, he had completely lost all grip on reality. All he was focused on was revenge and no doubt he is thinking he will finally have it.

I've been left under the watchful eyes of the doctor, the pilot and that bitch of a mechanic. My 'dear sweet hubby' and the other two have gone down to the cargo bay with whatever plan they have concocted. The rest of us have to wait.

As we near the net I can feel the tension beginning to roll around the room, filling it and threatening to choke all those in its path. Closer and closer, till the ship is nearly in the net. Nervous energy fills even myself as we wait.

But then it happens. A small explosion in one of the reactors and the others go down as well. Then a few windows in the station begin to crack and finally break. I'm guessing Gale finally had a chance to use his most precious gun. When he was tryin' to be nice to me he would tell me all about that stupid gun. He even named her…but I was to busy ignoring him to catch what it was. It was disturbing how attached a grown man like him was to that gun. Down right creepy really. He always said he couldn't wait for the perfect moment to use such a powerful piece of machinery. I guess that moment finally came.

I know that any on that space station is most definitely dead. Cato, his cronies, even his whore Glimmer and I am very glad about that last part. What a horrid woman. Everyone breathes a heavy sigh of relief when we pass through the net unharmed.

The quiet tread of boots alert me to the return of the captain. For someone who has caused me such a hassle she sure is amazingly light on her feet. It's a quality people in my line of business find very useful; I have to admit I'm a little jealous.

"Thank you." She scowls; I know it is tearing her up inside to have to thank a traitor like me. It gives me such a sense of satisfaction to see her so obviously repulsed by having to thank me.

"Annie, find me the nearest planet."

"Aye aye captain." The pilot says in her gratingly chipper voice.

So we fly, nearly an hour, until we come across a small planet. Farmers apparently.

We land and I dread what comes next.

They untie me and haul me from the ship. Gale throws me in the dirt and the dust and I have to cough a few times to expel the debris from my lungs.

"You're just going to leave me here?" I exclaim. I'm both shocked and impressed that this crew of softhearted, even compassionate, people have found the guts to just leave me on this rock.

"Yeah, that's the plan. I think you'll be just fine." Gale says with obvious disdain and disgust.

Then they leave. I watch as their ship fades away. At least I made it out alive…it sure would have been nice to have been paid though.

A/N: Hey! So just letting you know that I have two major papers due in the next two weeks so I don't know if I'll be able to update next week! Hopefully though! Fingers crossed that I actually finish my papers. Anyways! Please review and let me know what you think! I love hearing from you all.