JSC: Chapter 3 – The Escape

The palace shook as Lucas and Jane made their way down the hall flanked by guards. She still had her destabilizer drawn but the battle rod had disappeared again. “They must have more than one ship. I don’t know much about Changelings but if they breed like other batch reptiles we are in trouble.” Jane directed this to Jarrarde.

“Right. Let’s not find out!” He replied over yet another blast. The group entered the center chamber and moved to the tube chamber. Guards took up defense positions and Jane took the brief pause to adjust her outfit. She tore her dress halfway between her knees and hips. She also ripped the frills of the sleeves off and tore a sash belt from the excess dress fabric. After tightening the dress around her waist with it she shifted the now exposed pistol and rod holsters to the outsides of her legs. She was clearly no longer interested in being subtle.

Jarrarde had used this time to try to get the lifts up to their level; however, he wasn’t seeming to have any luck. Now ready to work Jane pushed him out-of-the-way and told him, “Cover me! Casper please get in this corner where you are better protected.”

We both did as she commanded and she set to work. Jane was opening the small purse that was slung across her body. Lucas noticed that its golden chain looked great against her red dress, ripped though it was. She retrieved an earpiece and the black arm plate that she affixed to their respective places. She activated the plate and it interfaced with both her earpiece and special contact lenses. The lenses weren’t as high-end as one of her full HUD setups, but it would do. She interfaced with the system and soon her fingers were doing their holographic dance.

The guards started firing and someone yelled at her to hurry and moments later the system unlocked. The lift was there in a few seconds but they were the longest seconds of Lucas’ life. Jane had disconnected from the system and even managed to get a few shots off before the doors opened. She turned on Lucas and pushed him inside. Once he was safely tucked to the side by the tube car’s control panel she was firing again. The elder and Jarrarde entered the lift and Jane closed the door without waiting for the rest of the men.

Lucas looked at his escorts in horror for leaving the men behind, but Jarrarde silenced any protest with, “They are doing their duty, my lord.”

Lucas nodded as the car descended to the ground floor. When the door opened Jane grabbed his hand and pulled him from the car. She turned to Jarrarde in the grand hall and said, “We should split up. We can’t let them take both the High Elder and the High Casper in one move.”

He nodded in agreement and began to cross to Lucas. She didn’t give him time to get there though because she was pulling Lucas across the grand hall toward a service corridor. She stopped at the small archway and turned to Jarrarde and the elder. She produced the last item from her bag and threw it at Jarrarde saying, “I will use this to contact you. I will get him off world and let you know the plan from there. Trust me. They don’t want the elder but we still must separate them. They wont chase me because they’ll assume I have the elder.”

Jarrarde caught the purple cube and looked as if he was about to protest. “You trust her my lord?” He yelled to Lucas.

“Completely.” Lucas said matter-of-factually.

Lucas thought that he heard Jarrarde say, “Good luck.” However Jane was already pulling him down the service corridor. She led him through a maze of doors, rooms, and halls with the aid of her HUD lenses. She had had the foresight to upload the palace schematics as well as maps of the surrounding area to her gear just in case. Eventually they burst out of a service exit where the trash deatomizers were stored. She manipulated her arm plate and her stealth ship shimmered into sight between two garbage units. The door ramp was already settling to the ground and she was about to pull him up it. As they hit the bottom of the ramp it started to raise while they walked.

She led him through the cargo hold to one of the hallways that run along the sides of the ship. From there they entered the common area which had a center hallway leading to the small command bridge. When they stepped up the bridge ramp she released his hand and pushed him toward a seat to the right. She stepped past his station and went to the larger one that was down center. This console was three times the size of the other two support stations and wrapped around her in a half circle. Jane could run the entire ship from it when the others were unmanned. This was the first time she had someone to sit at another station.

The engines came to life as the ship rose into the air. She took off so suddenly that Lucas was slammed against his seat. The restraints automatically affixed themselves to his body. Jane banked the ship and took off into the atmosphere. Lucas could see three ships firing at them head on but then break off when their shots didn’t make it through the anti-particle shields. He spun to look out the rear of the command bridge’s viewing bubble and caught a glimpse of the ships. They had looped back like they were going to chase them but then broke off and headed back for the capital city.

Lucas exhaled in relief and he spun back to the front of the ship. The area of the bubble in front of Jane’s station was filled with holograms that changed with every press on her console. The space outside the bubble seemed to change colors in waves and then the waves began to distort as the ship accelerated through to null space.

“Okay. We’re safe. We just hit NST and they can’t follow us there.” Jane informed him as she made some final adjustments on her console. She then turned her seat toward Lucas and released her restraints. He did the same as she made her way toward him. “What do you say we get you cleaned up?” She asked and for the first time since his coronation prep Lucas looked down at himself. He was covered in navy blue blood mixed with his own red blood from small cuts and scrapes. He looked like hell and, frankly, so did she. Hell suited her though. Her tiny frame looked very powerful in her blood spattered outfit. She grabbed his hand again and led him back down the ramp to the common area.

She sat him at the center table and stepped through the door that faced the center section of the ship that they had bypassed using the hallway on their way in. She came back with a damp towel and medical supplies. She set out to tend the worst of his wounds. After any major bleeding had been stopped she stopped treating him.

“I think you should just get a shower. I can tend the rest of your injuries after. The communal shower is just through here.” She said as she led him through the door. The door led to a crew area that included bunks, lockers, and a bathroom at the far end. The bathroom had two sinks and two flusher on one side and a shower room on the other. There were doors to the sides between the bunk and bathroom sections. They must lead to the rooms that are accessible from the outer hallways. It makes sense that there are other ways to get to those rooms in case of a hull breach.

“Communal showers?” Lucas had tried to ask as he entered the room.

“Yeah. There isn’t room for crew cabins and even my private quarters connects to this room for its, umm, amenities. This isn’t a luxury liner after all.” Jane responded as she stepped into the bathroom area.

Lucas followed but wondered why she felt the need to come this far in to show him the bathroom. Along the far wall there were towel and clothing dispensers along the top and soiled item collectors along the bottom. She turned to face him and said, “We both need to get washed up before we start having to deal with an infection. Who knows what those reptoids’ blood could do to us.”

He was about to nod in agreement when Jane started stripping her clothes off and tossing them into the collectors.

“Oh I didn’t know you wanted to go first. I’ll–”

He started to say but she stopped, now fully disrobed, and looked right at him confused. “This is a communal shower. I figured we could both, oh, I’m sorry my lord. I shall give you privacy.” Jane said in a fluster when she realized that she should have thought about decorum. She grabbed a towel from the dispenser and started to cross toward the door back to the common area.

As she passed him he grabbed her arm gently and apologized, “No! It’s not, I mean, I didn’t mean it like that.”

Jane’s arm naturally tensed in his grip but she relaxed as she looked in his eyes. He looked into her green eyes for a moment longer than he should have and then let go of her quickly. They both looked down but then he looked up since the rest of her was fully visible in that direction. She moved past him and entered the shower, flipping her towel over the DuraGlass divider that separated the bathroom from the shower. He stripped off his clothes and dumped them into the collector.

He stepped into the shower and Jane was scrubbing herself clean with some sort of foam block. They didn’t have such a thing in the palace. She looked over her shoulder at him and said, “Just put your hand under the dispenser and it will drop you a CleanBlock. When your done with it just drop it into that small collector by the shower door.” Her eyes lingered on his body for a moment and then she looked away but not before Lucas saw how red her face was.

“Something wrong?” He asked as playfully as he could manage while stepping up to his own shower head. She had turned the one next to her on to warm it up for him so he couldn’t avoid using the closest one.

“I just, it’s, it’s nothing. Don’t worry about it.” He turned his head to look at her but she was facing forward, face red as a the dress she had just discarded.  The next thing Lucas knew was that he had looked the whole way down her body to the floor but when his eyes made it back up to her face she was looking at him. Now it was his turn to blush.

“Have you ever…?” He let his question trail off but she quickly gave him the answer.

“No. The monks, well no. It never really came up. Me seeing boys that is. I always had my own quarters and, well, I wasn’t a normal girl. I had a grand purpose.” She let herself relax as she raised her arm dramatically. “Nothing else mattered.”

“Well I can sympathize, believe me. When the great stasis started I was eight years old. You were the only girl I saw until the awakening. It was just uncle Sisco and I.” By this point they are facing each other. They stared at each other for a long second.

“Get my back?” She asked him shyly as she turned around.

“Sure.” He agreed quietly as he began to wash her back. Now he was completely nervous.

When he was done she spun herself slowly to rinse but found herself in his arms somehow. They looked at each other, surprised by their unexpected contact. He must have moved at the same time. Next they let their eyes fall in unison on each others bodies.

She looked back up into his eyes and said with a shy smile, “I guess there are still things that I have to learn.”

“Thank makes two of us.” Lucas breathed as he let his lips approach hers, still slightly hesitant.

“We do have a while, you kn–”

Her last word was lost to the growing cacophony made up of sounds made by the ship and the shower, along with other more subtle sounds.