What Makes Us Human: Prologue

    Thomas sprinted around the corner, lungs burning with exertion. Had anyone seen him? Would anyone come for it? Surely it was valuable to someone? He shook his head in an attempt to dislodge the thoughts.

    “No time for doubts now,” Thomas thought through the deafening roar of his own pounding heart. He stopped at a small intersection and looked around. 

    Confident that no one was around, Thomas ducked into a nearby maintenance alleyway and made himself as small as possible in an attempt to hide behind a tangle of unlabeled pipes and assorted valves, wheels, and gauges. For the first time in what felt like days, he had a moment of peace to think.

    “Remember the plan. Give the stolen Hub to Gravel, get the information on Hannah, and bust her out. There’s between a handful and thousands of Bleek ships to get through, how hard could it be? I have myself, almost 10 hours experience on a range, Sherene, and the droid. Hell, maybe we should let the Bleek know we’re comin’ so they have a chance!” Thomas smiled to himself at the absurd thought, chuckling at the sheer weight of the tasks before him. He almost broke down into a full-blown laughing fit, but stopped when he heard the telltale sound of Security boots on manufactured deck steel. 

    Thomas crouched down lower, raising his jacket up to his neck to hide any exposed skin, breathing as shallowly as his belabored body would allow. The sounds of boots reached the intersection just behind him, and Thomas tried to will his heart to stop beating so loud, lest he be caught and Hannah lost forever.

    “Split up! He can’t have gone too far! Jenkins, check that maintenance corridor. Allen, Murph, head East towards the market. Harrison, stay here in case he comes back. Jeffries, with me. Let’s go see if a few credits won’t loosen the tongues over at Roxxie’s.”

    Thomas shifted his right hand from under his leg, moving carefully towards the small pistol in his jacket. He didn’t want to shoot anyone, but if this Jenkins is the only thing standing between him and his daughter…

-----

    Jenkins drew his sidearm, verified it had a full magazine of stun rounds, and approached the maintenance corridor. He had to crouch to avoid a few jutting pipes, and stopped before the main street lights were no longer illuminating the area. There was a large collection of unlabeled pipes on the ground to his right, and several such jumbles further in.

    “If you’re in there, come on out peacefully!” Jenkins shouted into the darkness. He hoped the murderer wouldn’t pick up on how terrified he was. “Those people you killed, those were all wanted criminals and known gang affiliates. If you come in peacefully, and tell us what you know about the Red Suns, we can probably drop your charges to ‘Disturbing the Peace’!”

    Jenkins stood there for another moment, contemplating going further into the dark, cramped access tunnel. He took a step forward, felt something soft under his foot, shuddered at what it might be, then decided he’d rather get on with his day. He turned and started walking away from the tunnel, holstering his gun once he was safely back at the intersection.

    “Nothing on my end Sarge, how’s Roxxie’s look?” he asked into his forearm comm.

-----

    Thomas listened as Jenkins wandered off towards Roxxie’s. He risked a peek over the metal tangle to see if Harrison was still guarding the intersection. Leaning up against a lightpost was a very bored-looking uniformed human woman, staring down the path Thomas had come from. Her back was to Thomas, and Jenkins was rapidly disappearing down the path towards Roxxie’s. 

    Thomas started backing down the narrow tunnel, keeping his eyes glued to the building just to the right of the woman. Thomas knew from experience that staring at a psychic sets off all kinds of alerts, so staring at something near them and keeping them in view was a good way to watch someone without alerting them, just in case. This, unfortunately, also meant that Thomas couldn’t see a damn thing that he was creeping over, let alone doing so hunched over nearly on all fours and moving backwards.

    His foot grazed pipe 32-CR4, a coolant delivery pipe which was 2 years overdue for maintenance. The pressure across the nearly-failed cap was enough to cause a rupture, loudly bursting and spraying near-boiling water down the hall behind him.

    Thomas froze as Harrison drew her gun and looked down the serviceway. “Who’s there?” she nervously asked.

    He looked away, not even wanting to risk looking near her while she was on full alert. A spike of fear shot up his back. Was this it? Will he never see Hannah again? 

    “No,” he thought. “I’ll kill her if I have to, no one is keeping me from you.”

    As Thomas steeled himself, taking a slow breath to steady his aim, he thought about everything he had been through to come to this moment, all the moments Hannah would never see again if he failed. He looked up, focusing all of his fear for his daughter, his hate for the Bleek who stole her, his anguish at losing his wife, every ounce of grief he had, and visualized a speartip, a point of confluence which would change everything.

    Harrison would never know how close her life was to ending, as at the moment Thomas pulled his gun and decided it was her time, a large pipe burst just in front of her, spraying steam in a massive sheet downwards, nearly burning her face and hands in the process.

    Harrison stumbled backward to escape the steam, tripping over yet another mishmash of pipes.

    “Shit! Shit shit shit! Stupid goddamn pipes, maintenance needs to get off their lazy asses and come down here dammit! Almost broke my skull, melted my damn nose and hands…”

    Thomas was frozen in place. He couldn’t see Harrison, but heard her trip and listened to her grumbling. He realized he didn’t have to kill her now, as his little mishap would be seen as nothing more than a maintenance slip up. After confirming the steam was not going to stop anytime soon, Thomas turned his back to the intersection, waited for his eyes to adjust, and carefully continued down the corridor.

    “I don’t know if someone is out there watching out for me…. But thank you,” He thought to himself. Now that he didn’t have to do it, he could admit to himself he didn’t want to kill anyone. He had never killed anyone, and didn’t plan on killing any humans anytime soon.

    A very uncomfortable and dark hour later, Thomas saw light through a tangle of what looked like data wiring. He crept up and peeked past to see if anyone was looking, nearly getting caught by a passing group of drunks. The street ahead was very crowded, the perfect place to disappear, as long as he didn’t draw any attention to himself. 

    He waited in that dark, cramped hallway, hot pipe digging into his side, for the perfect chance to get out. It finally arrived after almost 30 minutes of tense, uncomfortable stillness. Thomas stepped out, pulling out his personal Hub and quickly opening his text messaging app.

    Thomas put on a look of confusion, looking down at his Hub and back up a few times, trying his damnedest to appear as a lost tourist. He felt that 4 times was enough, and set off in a random direction with a manufactured look of annoyance. 

    “I’m gonna slap Bill, dude can’t give directions to save his life!” Thomas shouted mentally for the benefit of any nosy Psychics.

    Thomas disappeared into the crowd. Security would poke around the area hours later, but would never pick up his trail again.