Nick wished he'd thought of a plan better than the one he'd ended up doing. When they'd been marched out of the crawler, they weren't locked up right away. Instead they'd been seated on a set of crates on the edge of the dig site, at the edge of the grass. Before they'd been searched a second time, he'd dropped the vial behind his back. It had landed softly in a thick bunch of tall grass right by the crate where no-one was likely to step on it.
Judy was going to kill him. Fuck him up worse than the poison in that vial ever would. Then she'd step aside and let Bogo take a turn.
On their way to the metal brick of a building that held their makeshift cells, Nick had seen the door. Built into a raised part of the planet's rocky crust, he hadn't realized it was a door at first. The massive black gate better resembled a wall, engraved entirely in red hieroglyphs and just as ominous as the black liquid now buried in a bunch of grass.
Nick only knew it was a door because someone had mentioned a 'breaching procedure' on their way to their cells. Two hours from now, that's what they'd said. Nick didn't like the sound of that at all.
Nick kept thinking about the door even as he sat with Judy in a cell built entirely from clear glass, or acrylic, or whatever new material the Company had cooked up. Whatever it was, it cut off all sound and appeared at least 7 inches thick.These weren't meant for us, he thought with a chill.
The cells were connected by walls of thick steel so he couldn't see how the others were doing. Probably hoping Nick still had the vial hidden somewhere safe.
Nick, you idiot, you are so screwed.
"Did you hear what they called this place?" Judy sat against the glass hugging her knees.
"Nope."
"Dahaka. I don't think they came up with the name themselves."
Nick sat down beside her. "Carrots, that door screams Hunter alien tech."
Judy looked physically sick with anxiety. "And Bellwether wants to open it. Does she have any idea what she's dealing with?"
They hadn't realized anyone was outside until the door opened. Bellwether stepped into their glass box, flanked by her guards. Nick and Judy stood up, prepped for a fight but not expecting one.
"I'm not in the mood for pleasantries. Something was taken from that device you left in the cryotube. What was it?"
Nick could see why that she was not in the mood. "What's wrong, ma'am? Too much cognac?"
"Still being a cocky little fox, I see." Bellwether's tired eyes scowled. "You do realize that you're the one in a box without holes."
Nick didn't let his face change, but it sounded enough like a threat for him to heed it. "If you're talking about Flash's extraction device, there was a vial. It got left behind on the ship before it blew."
"What was it for?"
Judy spoke. "To extract a contaminant from Clawhauser's body. The Facehugger that attacked him infected him with it when the implantation failed. It could have happened when the muscles relaxed upon death."
"Like when some poor dead bastard shits himself." Nick said. He almost mentioned how it wasn't that common in real life, but he doubted the sheep would appreciate it.
Bellwether put her hooves on her hips and cocked her head, clearly trying not to look as ill as she was. "And that was?"
"Plagiarus Praepotens."
"Carrots…" Nick started.
"She's screwing with us, Nick." She said. "We stole their data, they know what we're hiding."
"Smart girl." Bellwether said with a smile. "Thought I am curious as to how our tests missed that he was carrying the pathogen."
"The trace was dormant. Miniscule. Only Minerva could have detected it."
"I see that the 90 million we invested in her was well spent." Bellwether said. "Thank you, by the way, for salvaging her brain. Now we just have to worry about finding a new assistant."
Her guards must have seen Nick's hackles raise, for they aimed their guns in his direction.
"How d'you know we didn't force her to help us?" Nick kept his voice even.
"She had so many chances to sound the alarm."
"No, she didn't, and you know-"
"Save your breath, Private. I'd have you all executed now, but then we'd have to explain ourselves to theAvellanoscrew. For now, you're under arrest for theft of data. I'd charge you with the destruction of theVidartoo, but really, who's gonna buy that?"
She turned to leave, strolling between her guards.
"What is Dahaka, Bellwether?" Judy asked.
The sheep froze. She gazed back at her prisoners over her shoulder.
"That is a dangerous question to ask, don't you think?"
"You know what's dangerous? Breaking into an underground base even the Hunters never wanted reopened." Judy's paws were balled. "When that Hunter attacked us, and yes, we know it escaped, it was wearing a suit. I didn't realize what kind of suit it was until we got talking about that vial. I don't know how it knew about Clawhauser's infection, but there's no other reason it would put on protection before coming after us."
She paused and glanced at Nick. Nick deduced the truth for himself at that moment.
"Unless there's another biohazard on this planet. A big one." Nick glared daggers at Bellwether, aghast at her hubris. "And the Hunters buried it behind that door."
Bellwether slowly clapped. "Very quick, Miss Hopps. And it's Dhi'Haka, by the way, not Dahaka."
Nick rubbed his forehead with both paws. "Let me get this straight, Cottonball. Thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of years ago, the Hunters discover a mysterious black goo. The Hunters, these… intergalactic warrior badasses… bring it here, to Dahaka or whatever you wanna call it, for study. To use as a weapon, to make themselves better hunters, who the hell knows? And what they learned… made themchange their minds… seal the place tighter than the Chernobull reactor… and not even leave behind a permanent security workforce out of fear of contamination."
Bellwether pursed her lips.
"But you… you're going to bust it open anyway, aren't you?"
"Do you think we are idiots?" She asked coldly. "You really think we would waltz in there unprotected?"
"You've spent all this time pissing off an alien race that wears nukes for bracelets. I'd say you're an idiot."
"Is that so?"
"Fuck yes. Because no matter what you do, they're not gonna let you leave this planet with that pathogen, so they'd either gonna nuke the site from orbit or cut little strips of skin off of you while you're still breathing. And that's if the goo doesn't get you first."
Bellwether's sharp bark of laughter stopped Nick in his tracks. "God, you are so wrong! You are so wrong if you think I never considered that!"
An aerial bombardment from the Mothership would have blasted the site into oblivion without risk of breaching Dhi'Haka. It was the best solution. The simplest solution. The only way to be sure. Too late they realized their mistake of overestimating the Company's stupidity.
The Hunter saw the explosions through the window of its ship, flashing like sparks in the vacuum of space. The Mothership flinched as the Midnicampum's cannons fired again and again, striking the Mothership just as it preparing to enter Rhamnusia's atmosphere.
The Hunter threw itself into the great chair and readied its own ship's armaments even as the Mothership fired back, its cannons firing flashes of blue-white, the ice to the Company ship's amber fire. Two shots of pure energy blasted the midsection of the Midnicampum into nothing, and the two halves floated apart in a shower of grey debris.
Two more Company ships shot in to continue the fray. The Hunter fired its own cannons, weaker shots of blue plasma that struck clear and true into the window of the bridge of one ship. The vacuum sucked out the occupants before the explosion faded; the charred corpse of a rhino bounced off the Hunter's window, seeping orbs of blood.
A stray blast of orange hit its ship. The Hunter felt the blow and quickly diverted the vessel out of the line of fire. By the time it was ready to retaliate, the Mothership had rammed itself into the third vessel face first. The Hunter watched silently as the Mothership plowed through the smaller ship until it exploded- burning light illuminated the entire bridge the Hunter sat in- and the Mothership emerged from the other side of the fireball with mere scratches.
The Hunter's control panel alerted it two another two blips. It growled out a challenge and fired upon the next target.
"And if they fail to take the Mothership out?" Judy asked.
"They won't." Bellwether said. "We know enough about their technology to know where their cannons are located. We'll strike them first. We've lost too many mammals over the years trying to get their damn technology. This time, they will not interfere."
"You don't seriously think that's going to stop them?"
Bellwether smirked. "If they survive, they're free to keep trying to stop us. If they can."
Judy stepped up to the sheep. "Bellwether, please. You have no idea what you're messing with. You don't know how much of Dhi'Haka has been contaminated, or if your gear will protect you from the infection!"
"It's our gear. I think it'll do its job just fine."
"No!" Judy shouted. "This isn't like handling cow pox. If it was that simple, the Hunters would have blown the place centuries ago and be done with it!"
Bellwether sighed and rubbed her chest. "This is a waste of my time." She turned to leave once more.
"Bellwether, will you stop being stupid?! You-"
"Say one more word and I'll add you to our list of test subjects."
Judy shut up. Bellwether muttered something about needing the restroom as she left with her guards in tow. The door sealed itself, and then Nick was alone with the rabbit once more.
They sat down, side by side, centimeters apart, and he took her paw in his. "There's nothing we can do."
"But…"
"Carrots, I want to save the world as much as the next guy, but let's face it. We can't stop this."
Judy rubbed her eyes. Nick hated to see how defeated the rabbit looked at that moment.
"Look on the bright side. If anyone deserves to learn the hard way, it's Smellwether."
Judy didn't reply to that, but the way her large, sad eyes hardened said it all. It took a while for those eyes to meet his.
"I'm sorry about Flash."
"Me, too. Finnick's gonna be pissed."
"That a friend of yours?"
"Yeah, before I got recruited. He didn't get the same offer I did." He didn't mention the reason for that.
"What's he doing nowadays?" Judy asked.
"Space salvage. Signed up as soon as he got out. So far as I know, he's exploring the cosmos about 40 light years from Earth."
Judy rested her head on Nick's shoulder. His breath hitched. "I left my camera on the ship." She said weakly. "I never got around to uploading the pictures. I should have done it."
Nick squeezed her paw gently. "We'll take more pictures. If somehow Bellwether decides to let us off with an NDA and a death threat, we'll get a camera. Get more pictures. Show everyone how incredible Rhamnusia is."
No doubt the Company would seal off the whole system after this fiasco, and it honestly hurt to realize that. Just like his limited freedom before his incarceration, Nick had taken this new home for granted. The state-of-the-art tech and verdant environment so many other colonies yearned for. The friendliness of the people, fox be damned. The pretty plumage of the Tracker birds whenever Nick harmlessly teased them into signing their song.
"I was going to be an engineer." Nick admitted. "It was safer that being on the field. I was about to start my training. You must think I'm a coward."
He felt Judy shake her head. "I did. But that was just me being jealous."
Nick chuckled. "Life threatening danger ain't all it's cracked up to be?"
"… Not when you can't lift a pulse rifle."
Nick laughed again and tried not to think about what she would do to him once she found out about the vial.
The Hunter's ship cruised aimlessly through the miasma of debris until it received a brief message from the Mothership.
Casualties were minimal. Those that perished had died with honor, but not in vain. The damage to the hull could be mended, but the cannons were lost. The Hunter cursed the Company, regretted not suspecting they would anticipate an attack from orbit.
The message ended with a simple order. The Hunter obeyed without question, turning its ship toward the planet.