Of Men and Spiders

Jonas checked the access codes used by the ship waiting to dock. Of course, they were about a decade out of date. He rolled his eyes. "Typical pirate! I swear, they are the most technologically inept people in space. I mean, how do you even manage a ship without knowing how the software works?"

Simon, who was working a station not far from Jonas, peeked up over his wall. "Something wrong?" Workers were running all around, seeing to one emergency after another, but that didn't really affect these two at their stations.

Jonas rolled his eyes. "Just the usual. This asshole is trying to use access codes that are over a decade old!"

Simon laughed. "Oh, that's nothing! Hell, a couple of months ago, I had some idiot try to use a code from back when we hadn't left the solar system yet! Apparently, he picked it up off some old decrepit asteroid mining drone floating through space for god knows how long and figured it was as good as any!"

That was a new one. Looking at his friend, Jonas had to know more. "So, did you let them on the station?"

Simon laughed. "Hell no! Well, not until management spoke with him and sent over a review team." That was pretty much what Simon was thinking of doing, too, but then his friend added, "But that wasn't right after a battle while the whole system was in chaos. Let me ask you, were they involved in the fighting at all?"

Reviewing some of the info they had on the ship, Jonas nodded. "Yeah, looks like they shot down a decent amount of incoming fire from the battleship. Probably not enough to have had a major impact on the outcome..."

Simon shrugged. "But all the volunteers put together probably did, of which they were one. And Captain Justeen promised them all room and board as thanks."

Well, that didn't help clarify things. "So what, you're saying I should let them on board?"

Simon shrugged. "Dunno. The question is, what's the worst outcome? You let someone on in the chaos after the battle and get reprimanded for being too lax, or you piss off one of the 'heroes' who then complains to Captain Justeen, who then takes a personal interest in you and not in a good way?"

Jonas rolled his eyes. Shit like this always rolled downhill. "Yeah, fair enough. You make a good point."

Simon grinned but shook his head. "Who, me? I didn't say anything. You came to this decision all on your lonesome!"

Jonas rolled his eyes, his friend's meaning clear. "Yeah, yeah, don't worry, I won't blab if I get in trouble."

Turning back to his console, Jonas opened up a channel to the ship that had been waiting. "Station 045-379 'Star-sitter' to holding vessel, 'Luck's End,' you're cleared to dock. Sending you an approach vector now."

The gruff older man who appeared on screen practically growled. "About time! Me and the boys weren't gonna wait much longer!"

Jonas fought the urge to roll his eyes. "Yes, the station is experiencing many technical issues in the aftermath of the battle. We thank you for your patience and hope you'll enjoy your stay aboard the 'Star Sitter.'"

Cutting the transmission and sitting back, Jonas wondered just how many more headaches he'd have today and hoped management would be too busy dealing with other issues to bother with a minor infraction like this.

That was when the alarms started blaring, making Jonas almost fall out of his seat. Had he screwed up worse than he'd thought? At a glance, the 'Luck's End' hadn't docked yet, so it wasn't his screw-up. He just about heaved a sigh of relief when the sound of gunfire put him back on edge.

A quick glance at the system management screen showed him the problem lay in another docking area, so it would likely be resolved before it could impact him. Still, that was a lot more gunfire than he was used to hearing from a random drunken brawl.

Jonas looked over at Simon, who glanced back and nodded. Together, they got out of their seats to see what was going on, only to hesitate when a bunch more security, some of them in combat suits, came running past.

Simon suddenly seemed a lot less curious. "Ummm...that's...a lot more gunfire than usual..."

It sure was. And it seemed like it was getting closer. Also, there was a lot of shouting... Jonas looked over at his friend again, speaking more hesitantly. "Maybe...we should get out of here?"

Some of the shouts were becoming intelligible as one person shouted over another. "What the hell is that?" "Kill it! Kill it with fire!" "To hell with this! I'm out!"

Simon nodded, "Yeah, I think it's time to let someone else worry about things!" and started running.

Jonas was about to do the same when he felt a sudden jab of pain. Looking down, he saw a freakishly large spider skittering away after having bitten him. He didn't have time to worry about that now. It was time to run. Except, for some reason, his legs weren't moving very fast... Then, the ground jumped up at him, and all the chaos and sounds around him slowly faded.

-

Lucy walked out of the ship into what looked like a warzone. As she stepped over one corpse, she shook her head. "I hope you're not just killing everyone. We don't need to turn the entire station into a total bloodbath."

Charlotte, who'd saved at least one of her larger selves to accompany Lucy, shook her head. "I've only killed the active threats, though I did neutralize several potential complications. However, barring someone else's involvement, they'll likely live."

Lucy looked at her partner in this raid as she walked through the least blood-soaked floor plates. "Likely?"

As usual, Charlotte didn't show any emotion. "I don't have enough appendages to watch over everyone I've neutralized, so there's the potential of complications, but there is a meager chance of fatal occurrences."

Lucy shrugged as she stepped around a bisected corpse wearing the remnants of a combat suit. "Well, that's understandable. Anyway, we need to get to the central part of the hub. That's where they'll have the servers I need access to."

-

When security had first reported back that they were being overridden by a bunch of bugs, Eric thought they were screwing around, but a quick review of the security feeds in the area revealed that to be true. He watched as one formation was devastated by what appeared to be a grenade that launched out a swarm of some kind of biting or stinging insect. The two in combat armor seemed unaffected until a giant bug with scythes swooped in and cut one in half, while the other was shot repeatedly by what looked like paintballs that appeared to restrict the movement of their joints, leaving them vulnerable to the spiders that swarmed over them.

As Eric watched, more and more bugs swarmed out of the ship, quickly overrunning the locally positioned security. He quickly triggered a station-wide alert, directing every available team to secure the location while also calling for backup from the Raven's Roost, knowing they probably wouldn't arrive for some time as they were off chasing the battleship that had attacked.

Pulling up all the info he had on the ship the bugs were pouring out of, he could see the ship's name was the "Red Widow." Someone obviously had a sick sense of humor. They'd participated in the battle and had apparently had older authentication codes, but that was hardly unheard of out here. There was no record of the ship visiting in the past, but even that wasn't unheard of, as it was common for pirates to change their ship IDs frequently.

He pushed himself away from his desk in frustration. None of this was helpful in any way. He'd better get something; if this many people died and he didn't have any useful information afterward, the best he could hope for was to be demoted and shipped to some middle-of-nowhere station to monitor empty space for the rest of his life.

That was when something on the screen watching the ship caught Eric's eye. There was yet another giant monster, but this one was walking beside a human...and they seemed to be talking, but the human was turned away, so he couldn't make anything out. Then she turned.

Eric froze the feed and stared, speaking out loud under his breath. "No way..."

Hopping over to another computer, he pulled up an old database, and with only a little searching, he found what he was looking for. Then, looking between the two screens, he was sure. That was Lucy, Lucy the Red, Captain Drakes's lost daughter.

With that realization, this whole thing instantly went from a nightmare to way above his pay grade. Eric walked over to the com station and powered it up, putting through a connection to a port he was told never to connect to. After a moment, a bored-looking man appeared opposite him on the screen. "What is it?"

Eric hesitated only a moment. "I got a report that needs to go directly to Captain Drake. We're under attack, and the assailant is..."

The man rolled his eyes. "Yeah, we know. A battleship. From the reports we've got, it's already withdrawn. Why are you bothering us now?"

Eric shook his head. "No, not the battleship. Someone is on the station, and they're overwhelming our security. They've already cut through half our forces, and I don't expect the rest to last much longer."

That got the guy's attention. "What?!? How did this happen? No, wait, that'll come later. Right now, we need to..."

Finally losing his own patience, Eric cut him off. "That's not all! Tell Drake that the person leading this attack is Lucy, his daughter! She'd got a whole horde of some kind of giant alien bugs fighting for her!"

Unsurprisingly, the man looked skeptical. "This better not be some kind of prank. Captain Drake has killed people for less."

Looking back at the feed and watching Lucy and the alien casually walk through a room splattered in gore like some sort of Greek gods walking through a battlefield, Eric found his mouth had suddenly gone very dry. What was worse was when the alien casually reached down and grabbed a fallen rifle one of the security had wielded. "He'll have to get in line."