LOST REVENGE (7 page)

The pleasure of
revenge lasts several minutes and the head pain reminds me of my current
situation. I can’t just stay here. I need to fix the antennae and get in touch
with flight control. The aliens are dead and cold by now. I need to get back to
work.

“Pressurize the
entire ship.”

“Closing vent one to
six. Pressurization will complete in two minutes.”

“Hiss.”

“Pressure stable at
760 torr. Central life support systems activated. Artificial gravity system
failed.”

Artificial gravity
failed. How come? I guess something was sucked out. Well, I will deal with it
later after I fix the antennae.

“Unseal the mainframe
compartment.”

“Clank, clank,
clank.”

“Hiss.”

“The mainframe
compartment unsealed.”

I slowly fly to the
door and push the inside door open. Flying through the short corridor, I grab
the handle on the outside door and push it open.

The outside corridor
is quiet and empty.

I wait several
seconds and then fly out.

Lights flicker and
suddenly my body is so heavy.

Gravity is back.

I plummet on the
floor, landing on my chest.

“Crack.” Something
hit on my lower back.

“Ah, ah…” I cry out
of pain, cold sweat oozing out of every pore, my body shaking out of
control.

My spine is broken. I
can’t even feel my leg. I turn my head and see a tall oxygen cylinder lying
across my lower back. At the same time, fast and heavy steps are getting closer
and closer.

The bomb in my hat.

Yes. The bomb.

My left hand is
reaching for the watch on my right wrist. Just at this moment, a spacesuit
comes into my view and a foot crashes my left hand into a pancake.

“Ah, ah.” I scream.

“Look, what we got
here.” That’s Ausak’s voice.

I raise my head. That
is Asuak in spacesuit, followed by his crew in spacesuits.

More steps rush to
me. They lift me up and carry me to the medical bay. There they set me on a
chair and fasten me tight.

It’s all over.

It’s all over.

I can’t help but cry,
tears drowning my eyes, desperation and fear filling in every corner of my
heart. There is nothing I can do. I know this is the end.

They take off
spacesuits and go back to their alien form. One alien comes to me, yanks off my
hat and fixes my head with two restraints. Now I can’t even move my head.

While Asuak is
preparing something near another table, another alien comes to me and says, “I
know what you are thinking. Why we have to fake Lily’s body? You see she
critically injured one of our crew and we have to keep him on life support in
medical bay. We make him look just like Lily, so that you wouldn’t find out
your Lily is dead. We thought it was perfect. If anyone else plays Lily, you
would find it out by just talking with her. That brings up my question. How did
you find out it is not Lily?”

Asuak comes back and
says, “Step away. You two can talk later. I guess now you have reached the
point where your head is so hurt that you can’t even think. Am I right?”

I stare at him without
a word.

“Listen. You can tell
me the code or I take it out of your brain. That will hurt a lot.”

“You can’t take it
out of my brain.” I say confidently.

“We planted a bug
into your head when you were in coma, because we are concerned that you
wouldn’t tell us the access code if you were awake. The bug is extracting all
the information there. I know what you ate tasted like shit, because we added
the forage for the bug. The problem is we have to wait a certain amount of time
to harvest the bug and we planned to keep you under during that period of time.
But Lily, your wife, woke you up. We are supposed to wait 7 days, but it seems
the bug is now ready.”

“Fuck you!”

“This is not our way
of doing things, but your species leave me no other choices.” Asuak says while
pushing the chair under the surgical lights.

At the corner of my
right eye, I see my hat. It is right in front of the oxygen cylinder cabinet.
The cabinet door is open and there are three cylinders. It used to have four.

Asuak moves a pen
like thing to my left eye.

“This is going to
hurt.”

“Wait, wait, wait.”

“You change your
mind?”

“Yes.”

“OK, I am listening.”

“The access code is
stored in my watch. My right wrist.”

Asuak removes the
watch from my right wrist and says, “After I get the code, I will kill the bug
instead of taking it out. Now tell me.”

“Press the top button
one time and the middle button two times. Then it will show you the code.”

“Top one time and
middle two times.” Asuak says while pressing them.

“Bang!” A small
explosion lights up the medical bay, followed by a slew of big ones.

The compartment
depressurizes in a less than a second. I don’t hold my breath. I know Lily is
waiting for me. I know. I know.