Station Breaker

72 Captive Audience

I'm pretty sure I'm not dead. For one, I'm still thinking, which is a good sign. For another, although I can't see, I'm pretty sure that the afterlife isn't just the sound of a bunch of Russians arguing.

They're going too fast for me to pick up. All I can gather is they've been trapped in here until I opened the door.

From what else I can surmise, I'm not exactly being heralded as their rescuer — my hands and feet are bound.

I'm not sure how many times someone has been tied up like this in space, but I can tell you that not only is it uncomfortable, I keep banging into the wall.

"Prostite! Prostite!" I say in Russian, begging their pardon.

Someone whips off the hood. A man with a head shaped like an orange points a finger at me and shouts in Russian, "It's him!"

There are four others in the module. I recognize the red-haired woman, Sonin, from the first time I was up here. There's another woman, a little older with blond hair and two men. Neither of them was the one that stared me down in the Unicorn.

"Why are you here?" asks Sonin.

"Why have you tied me up?"

"You ask questions not," growls the round-headed man.

"Let me guess, you're Sergey."

"See! He is spotter!"

"That's spy, Sergey," says Sonin. "Why are you here?"

Sergey isn't having any of this. "We must tell Commander Yablokov!"

"Yablokov is the one that locked us in here," says the blond. "Let's see what the American has to say."

"I say you let me go and we talk about this like civilized people."

The other man watches me quietly from the sideline. I can see he's holding something behind his back.

I nod towards him. "And tell this guy to lay off whatever he's got planned?"

They ignore my plea to be set free.

"Okay… So we're just going to hang out here while your commanders start World War III? Fine. I can chill."

"What do you mean?" asks the blond woman.

"Hi, I'm David Dixon." I manage to tumble around and bring my open hand towards her.

"You are not amusing. Last time you were here we lost a crew member."

"Well, if he was helping your commanders with what's in the secure section, then it wasn't much of a loss. Two good people died up here because of what you assholes are hiding."

Sergey turns red, raises a fist and kicks off towards me.

Sonin pushes him out of the way. "Nyet!" She turns to me with an equally angry expression. "Explain everything now!"

"Fine. You just want the broad strokes? Your boss back in Roscosmos, Zhirov, had his pals smuggle a nuclear weapon up here so he can use it to threaten President Radin in a coup attempt. Right now your commanders are squirreled away in the secure module trying to figure out how to make it go 'boom' without the trigger chip my friends stole."

"This is lie," says Sergey.

"Then why did I find you locked inside here?"

The blond is the first to speak up. I get the sense she's the nominal leader of the group. "Commanders Yablokov and Domnin said that one of us is a spy selling state secrets to the Americans. They secured us inside here while they are searching the station for evidence."

"Right. That makes sense. Except for the fact that I've been in every section of this station except the secure section — which I assume only they have access to — and didn't run into your crack team of detectives scouring for clues. So either this was just a ploy so Yablokov and Domnin could enjoy some man-on-man quiet time away from your prying eyes, or they're lying to you."

"This bomb, what would it look like?" asks the man floating in the corner.

"They described it as a suitcase nuke, which I guess means roughly suitcase-sized."

"And what is the yield?"

"Nobody told me. But enough to cause an EMP that would wipe out the power grids and telecommunication systems, plus fry most anything that has a circuit board."

"This is a lie," insists Sergey.

"Life is full of disappointments, pal."

"And why are you here?" asks the woman.

"I'm the fucking cavalry. I volunteered to come up here on a one-man mission to try to steal the nuke before your boss back on Earth pulled the trigger."

"Your plan doesn't seem to be working very well," says Sonin.

"That's all a matter of perspective. A few minutes ago I didn't think I was going to have any help. Now I have all of you." I try to give them a smile that's far more cocky than I feel. "So who wants to let me out?"

Sergey blurts something that sounds a lot like, "Let's beat him until either blood or the truth spurts from his cracked skull."

"Sergey, watch him," says the blond as she pulls the others into a floating huddle.

My bodyguard brings his round face in front of mine, waiting for me to do something.

"So… you read any good XKCD cartoons lately?"

I watch something flicker in his eyes. For a brief moment I think he's about to hit me. Instead he growls, "They are not funny. You are not funny."

"Maybe not intentionally."

The conversation comes to an end and the others drift towards me.

"Sergey, cut him loose," says the woman, then adds, "If he does anything suspicious hit him."

"He already looks suspicious to me," Sergey replies as he unties my hands.

I rub my wrists and fake a smile. "I'll work on that. So can we try this again? I'm David Dixon." I hold out a hand.

He stares at it for a moment then reluctantly shakes it. "I still believe nothing."

"Well, let me tell you everything I know and then you can decide."