Rowan wished he could hold his nose in the graxlian section of the station. The general body odor of lizardeens, their desire to eat putrid meats, and the fact that there were dead and dying from the KG-1's plasma weapon made his descent into the station an unpleasant one.
He was armed with a plasma rifle and loaded down with as many spare energy cells that he could carry. In his mind's eye he had a schematic of this section of the station with a flashing path to where the crab robots had found Paige. A few of the robots had taken up positions at vents to alert him to the movements of the graxlian soldiers.
Rather than fight every group, Rowan would bypass them by taking alternate routes. One important thing was to find a station control node.
Dicia sounded in his mind. "Take this hatch and go down a level. There will be a long corridor. Halfway down that, stop and face left. There will be an access panel there."
Rowan ventured forth but his heart rate steadily climbed as he heard the screech of lizardeens dying in the dark. He opened the door to the long corridor to see three graxlians wheel around.
"Contact!" They yelled and started charging him, grabbing for their hyperblades.
Rowan let out a battle cry and leveled his rifle at the aliens. He pulled his trigger four times letting out three round pulses of plasma energy. Because of the tight space of the corridor, Rowan really couldn't miss. Each hit would vaporise a softball size chunk of flesh and cook a much larger basketball sized chunk.
"Dicia, it looks like these guys only have rifles for the front lines."
She replied, "Yeah, they thought they could take the station over with the marines so they only seemed to have brought on enough weaponry to cause a problem and take hostages. Quick, get that remote control link installed and things will get a lot easier."
"Damn, it smells like a barbeque in here. I can hardly see from the smoke."
"Cutting through four decks with a column of plasma really cuts down on the ventilation. I recommend you put on your rebreather unless you want to be coughing up vaporized graxlian for the next few days."
"Fine, fine." He pulled the mask from a pocket inside his suit and slipped it over his head. He put his rifle down and removed the panel. Out of his ammo bag, he pulled a box with a whip antenna and placed it in the panel. The last step was hooking up a communications cable into the local controller. Once the data link light started flashing, the schematic in his mind flooded with more detail.
"Ahhh, finally!" Dicia yelled. "I can see clearly now. I'm locking down all the hatches and non-critical ventilation shafts. They're going to have a hell of a time trying to get to you."
"Thanks babe."
"Oh Rowan, don't sweet talk me when you're rescuing your girlfriend."
From now on I will always be on her good side. I know what she's capable of.
"So where do I go now?"
The schematic's route changed to an open area where the night club was. He ran through the corridors and each door opened as he approached. Rowan could hear graxlians cursing and hammering the sealed doors as he ran past them.
When he ran through the last set of doors he came to a smoke filled chamber illuminated with red emergency lighting. In the center stood a grotesque building that was constructed to look like it was made of giant bones. He sensed there were several heat signatures inside the building through Dicia's sensors.
"Do you have another way I could get in? I don't like the idea of walking through the front door."
"There's a service entrance at the back. I don't have control over that lock, you'll have to blast your way in."
Rowan trotted around the back of the building and saw a door with a deadbolt control. He took a deep breath. After this shot, things would be happening awfully fast.
One three round pulse of the gun turned the deadbolt into a lump of molten metal. He used the butt of his rifle to pull the door back. Graxlians let out battlecries all around him. He heard the sound of gunfire, but he wondered what they were shooting at. Looking inside, the building was essentially a giant sex dungeon. The walls were covered in manacles and the rooms had various benches and tables. He really didn't want to think about what went on in this place.
"Where is she?"
"One more room ahead."
Rowan kicked down the door to see the graxlian who had eviscerated Connor holding up Paige's limp naked body with a gun to her head.
"Not so fast. human! One false move and the female gets her brains blasted."
"Let her go!"
"Heh heh heh. I cannot believe commander Z'taz was right. You really do care about her. I'm surprised such a fine fertile specimen would fall for a slob like you."
Rowan still had his rifle pointed at the graxlians head but Paige was being held in front of him like a human shield.
"Why don't you put down the girl and fight me fair?"
"Do you really think graxlians got this far by playing fair?"
Rowan looked around the area hearing footsteps. Soldiers were moving through the building trying to surround him.
He furrowed his brow. "Why don't I just kill you now? There's no chance of you letting me live."
"That is true. But your beloved would get to live. She'll grow to love me in time."
Rowan saw Paige's eyes open. A second later she gave a wink and then used her arm to bring down a hammer blow to the lizardeen's gonads. He let Paige go and grunted. As he leveled his pistol at Paige sprawled out on the floor, Rowan felt a weight come off his chest as he squeezed the trigger. The first bolt vaporized the graxlian's head while the next two tore him in half.
Rowan ran to Paige and grabbed her by the arms. "Paige, are you okay? Can you walk? We need to get out of here."
Paige hugged Rowan. "You saved me! You actually rescued me!"
"I promised I wouldn't give up on you. We're not out of the woods yet, girl. I have a ship on the surface of the station. We have to get up there quickly. The girls are drawing away the graxlians from here. If we don't move fast they may come back."
A side door opened and a lizard man stumbled through. He was clutching a crab robot that was tearing his face to ribbons. "Get off me you piece of shit!"
Rowan ended the lizard's agony before pulling Paige to safety.
…
"Sweetheart, is there really enough room in here for the two of us?" Paige said as she poked her head into the KG-1.
"It's going to have to do. We don't have much time. A detachment of lizards are closing in on us. We need to get back to the bunker.
Rowan got into the pilots chair and Paige had to sit in his lap and wrap her arms around him. They closed the hatch and detached from the station as a door on the other end of the airlock started to open up showing the talons of graxlian feet.
Soon they were flying over the greeblie of the station when Paige started nibbling on his ear.
"I love you Rowan."
"I love you too Paige." He stuck his pinky in his ear and wiggled it.
"The robots you built and the other species are taking control of the station."
"Paige, I feel like I'm hearing double. Why are you and Dicia saying the same thing at the same time?"
Paige's eyes widened. "Ooops!" She covered her mouth and giggled. "Cats out of the bag I guess."
"You and Dicia are the same?"
"Yes sweetheart!" She gave him a long kiss, causing him to briefly lose control of the fighter. "It was so hard keeping the secret from you when you were so sweet to me as Dicia. I wanted to spill the beans."
"Why didn't you?"
"And stop you from rescuing me as Paige? It was so romantic!"
His console started flashing warning lights and a moment later a dozen large spaceships came out of hyperspace above the station.
"The lycan fleet!" Rowan said. "The nictids are here as well!" He looked at Paige and hugged her. "We're saved!"
She hugged back. "No Rowan, you saved us!"
…
Rowan and Paige stood in front of a holo projector in his apartment. A very imposing old man in full dress uniform stared down at them. Paige was wearing one of Rowan's sweatsuits.
"Admiral Colax, it's such an honor to have you contact me. I hope you are well."
"Ah Mr. Rowan Millman, we're just getting reports of some violence on Pax Orbis."
"Yes, the graxlians had attempted to take over the station. We formed a group among the other races to fight off the graxlian warship and rescue the station control officer Paige."
"Mr. Millman, Pax Orbis has been fully automated for hundreds of years. There are no officers. In fact, no humans should be on the station at all. My intelligence officers tell me you are an illegal worker."
"What?! I was told that this was a legitimate business."
"Ha! A cyborg brothel on a godforsaken station outside of republic space? You must be mad or stupid, perhaps both."
"Please don't speak of my sweetheart that way Admiral."
"And who might you be?" The admiral muttered under his silver mustache.
"My name is Dicia Paige. I run things around here."
"Are you a human?"
"Well, mostly." She shrugged.
"Well it doesn't matter. Rowan Millman, I order you confined to quarters until a military police ship can be sent to Pax Orbis to pick you up."
"Come on Admiral, you can't be serious." Rowan started talking with a higher voice. "Just please talk to Electra…"
"Electra Bayez? The notorious mob boss? Heh, we just had the secret police lock her up. You'll be getting no help from her. Why not enjoy your time with your cyborg friends for the next few weeks. You're going to be put away for a very long time."
"But what did I do?"
"You got involved in a major interstellar crisis young man! Do you know how many graxlians you killed with that junk fighter!? We're going to have to double the number of mines in the great mine field. We may have to feed you to the wolves and hand you back to the graxlians to appease them."
Paige got in front of the man. "You'll do no such thing." Her eyes grew cold.
"You really don't have the power to stop me young lady. Rowan is a cur, and a stain on humanity. Justice will prevail."
Paige twitched. "There's no way I can convince you to reconsider?"
"Mr. Millman is a human and never should have been on the station. I don't know how he got on board. He's a member of a cyborg prostitution ring illegally operating there. After a fair trial, he will be going to prison."
"If I can't have my sweetheart, no one will."
"What?" The admiral said.
"Yeah, what?" Rowan said.
Paige turned around. "Sweetheart, it's time for you to go." She kissed him, put one hand on Rowan's shoulder, and with the other plunged her hand into his chest. "I love you."
Well ain't this a bitch…