I flexed my fingers around the detonator.

  Years of planning and months of preparation had led me here. There already was no going back, but the switch in my hands felt like an apt metaphor for a point of no return. Like the button on top of the cylindrical device would generate my new life like a computer program. No matter what happened after I pressed it, it would be what I wanted. It would release me from my prison, or kill me. I wanted to live, of course, that was always the preferred outcome, but from a certain perspective, dying was a freedom in itself. And that is what all of this had been about from the start, freedom.

  I had been on this cursed ship my whole life, I knew I had a life before it, I even saw it sometimes, in my dreams. But it was just information, nothing I could feel, like I had read it somewhere and tried to recite it years later. I know there had been a small village on a coast, I know that the sky had been blue, the air warm, and the people kinder. Information, not emotion. I didn’t care too much though, what mattered to me was the here, now, and what would come next, life didn’t become easier being upset about the past.

  The detonator was linked to a military grade hull-breacher. A small disc that’s placed on the outside of a ship to blow a person sized hole in it. Usefully, it was also remarkably effective from the inside of a ship, and easy to hide on larger command bridges; like the one on this vessel. It wouldn’t destroy the thing, not even close, it would take another ship of similar size to even put a dent in it, they would probably recover from the damage in a single cycle. But it would cause some much needed chaos, and it would kill all, or at least most, of the people on the command deck. Meaning I wouldn’t be chased until the fight for leadership had finished. Not long, but more than enough time for what I needed.

  I didn’t want to kill everyone there. Marin, the other girl who had been chained to the boss’ side, was lovely, and one or two of the pilots had snuck me a snack a few times. But for this plan to work, the boss needed to die, no matter the cost. Only that would give me the time to disappear. Thankfully the ‘guest’ he had brought aboard seemed about as evil as him, which made me feel a bit better about the whole thing. He had come from the planet we were orbiting. I didn’t know the place's name and I didn’t rightly care. It was populated and it wasn’t here, it was a good enough escape for me. The man himself seemed important, his clothes expensive and his eyes greedy. The look he gave me would have sickened me if I hadn’t of seen it hundreds of times before. The skin changes but the intentions remain. He had liked the look of me so much I had been told to meet him in the guest quarters after he had finished his chat with the boss, it had made me smile slyly, I couldn’t help it. Thankfully it was seen as flirtatious, not malicious.

  I sighed one last deep breath, cutting off my train of thought.

  This is it.

  I pressed the button.

  It took more pressure than I expected, but to be fair to myself I had never clicked it before. There was a brief moment of anticipating silence, I hoped and hoped it worked. If I had any faith, I would’ve muttered a prayer, but it was never really my thing.

  The hallway I was stood in went black, the florescent bulbs sounding like rats in the walls as they flickered off. An alarm overwhelmed my hearing. After a moment, deep red emergency lights glared from the ceiling, making the white padded walls look like they’d been stained with blood. More lights lined the floor, trailing off around the corner, they would lead me to one of the ships designated ‘safe rooms’, I ignored them and followed the path I had memorized months ago.

  At least now I knew it had worked, the alarms blaring had a high-pitched rapidity that signified a hull breach. Unless somehow one of the crew accidently had a smoke break in the weapon bay for the third time, everyone on the bridge was dead, and for a comfortable amount of time, the gang lacked any definitive leadership.

  Corridors in a ship of this size weren’t hard to navigate. This one, like most, had set them up in a grid like formation; long, straight, lines running parallel to, and intercepting with, long, straight, lines. My stop was in the centre of the grid, the most protected part of any ship that valued its crew, the escape pod bay. Granted, the people inhabiting this ship didn’t really value each other, but then again, the ship hadn’t been designed with this particular crew in mind. Junk left unrestrained in the halls and torn-out stuffing of the padded walls were evidence of this alone. It turned out pirates didn’t really care if somebody got injured during a gravity failure, but they did care that they could earn some money selling the non-essential components installed beneath the safety precautions.

  I peeked around the corner where I knew my escape to be, armed guards were shouting at each other, their voices muffled under the deafening alarm. They weren’t guarding the pod bay, but the armoury that was a few rooms down. They would spot me going into the bay, there wasn’t enough debris between us to hide my approach. I really didn’t want to be spotted, it meant there was a possibility I would be followed, a slave girl didn’t usually warrant that kind response but if they discovered I was responsible for the boss’ death, and they would, they would hunt me until they got bored, something that took annoyingly long for them in my experience. Plus, they tended to honour their loyalty to dead leaders, a practice I can’t pretend to understand.

  The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

  I turned back and took a deep breath. There was no way I would be able to get past them without being spotted, I couldn’t wait for them to move because during an emergency they would only leave their post when ordered. Even pirates knew that you don’t leave an armoury unguarded during an emergency, especially when your workforce is a few loaded weapons away from an uprising. I couldn’t take them on myself, for obvious reasons; they were four strong and armed, I was alone and barely had clothes on, let alone armour. The only option I had was to make a break for the escape pods and hope they would miss. They would fire on me, even I made it obvious I wasn’t trying to arm myself; they still wouldn’t want me leaving on my own terms. A bolt of super-heated light through my skull was cheaper than a new pod, after all. I cursed to myself, and checked their position again, they hadn’t moved at all and were still shouting at each other, it would take them a second at most to see me and react.

  No time like the present. I quickened my breathing, and went for it. I almost tripped over with my first step, I caught myself and pushed forward. I hadn’t run faster in my life, mainly because sprinting on a ship usually ended with you slamming into someone, or something, not something I was overly concerned about at that moment. Each step sent a shockwave through my bones, sending a deadening thud throughout my body in a polyrhythmic beat with my pounding heart.

  It took four steps before they saw me, thankfully I hadn’t had to worry about them hearing me over the almost nauseating pulse of the alarm, so I had more of a head start than I expected. They shouted something at me, I didn’t hear. They hesitated to fire immediately, they knew I was ‘favoured’ by the boss, and would rather not get on his bad side by shooting me without obvious cause, another unexpected bonus. That privilege lasted all of three more steps as they raised their rifles, they were laser-based weapons, at least from the look of them, which meant they would really hurt. I was over halfway to the door now, only a few more steps and I would be as good as free. Panic shot through me as a bolt flew by my head. It was gone in a blink. I didn’t hear it fire, the only evidence of a bolt being fired at all was the imprint it briefly and painfully left in my retinas. Another shot, this one slammed in front of me, igniting the soft floor for a split second before the material hardened and blackened. My bare foot slammed into where it had hit, what was once fabric shattered in a brittle mess, I felt a sting of pain as it cut my skin.

  I slammed my fist into the button, the door forced itself upwards, scraping against its frame.

  Too slow, too slow, too slow.

  I felt a pang in my stomach, like I had given myself a stitch after running too fast. When I smelt the burnt flesh, I realised I had been hit, despite the lack of feedback I was getting from the wound. I stumbled backward into the room, slamming the emergency override on the other side. They wouldn’t be able to get in, at least until they took control back of the bridge, or if one of them knew the code (Thankfully I was aware that nobody alive on the ship knew the code anymore).

  I looked down, moving my hand from my side, fearing the worst. A gasp involuntarily escaped me, it wasn’t good, but it was far from bad.

  Had I been wearing anything that actually covered most of my body, I would’ve been much better off, probably a painful burn. But since my position on the crew is validated only by the ogling attention of monsters, I hadn’t been permitted anything decent. There was a bloody wound in my side. It looked far worse than it felt, surrounded blisters and burns from the heat, it had broken through my skin, but not far, I could see muscle beneath the fingernail sized hole. All things considered, it was probably the best injury I could've asked for if I knew I was going to be shot, the lack of cleanliness in the air itself, combined with excessively poor maintenance was probably to blame. I was beyond lucky, it should’ve gone straight through my body. I couldn’t feel it fully, not yet. For now, it was just a distant throb, I had to make the most of my adrenaline before it compromised my concentration completely.

  Finally, I took note of my surroundings. I was in the escape pod bay (thankfully I had remembered where it was), and it was completely empty of life, a nice bonus. Along each wall were the pods, set into divots in the wall, there were a few missing but overall, there must have been at least 20, not nearly enough for the whole crew, but enough for the important ones in case they couldn’t make it to their shuttles. They were meant as a last resort, a ship of this size had multiple safe rooms and escape shuttles, pods were only useful in orbit, and when all alternatives had been exhausted. I moved slowly to one, not choosing any in particular, they were probably all as likely to break as each other, and I didn’t know what I would have to look out for. As I clambered in, I sighed in relief as I noted the comforting lack of complicated controls, I hadn’t been able to scout out this far on my own and was really hoping I didn’t need to decipher a manual to eject myself. There were two levers, and a button, each labelled for their purpose of getting me as far away from this ship as I could get. Even the harness was simple, I tightened each strap until they dug into my skin, I wasn’t taking any chances. I palmed the button, the hatch closed in front of me with a clunk and a hiss of an airtight seal. No going back now.

  My hand gripped the first lever tightly, I was shaking slightly, not out of fear, but because my body was starting to dissipate an amount of energy that could break a man’s neck. I exhaled slowly, unlike my body, it was steady, determined. I didn’t know what awaited me outside of the prison where I had grown up, and had been trapped in my whole life. I had never even been on a planet since before I could remember, let alone been able to choose for myself. I had imagined what life free of this ship would be like; a comfortable and luxurious paradise, or maybe it was just another prison with different walls, but now it was so close I had no idea what to expect. Anything could be out there.

  I grinned.

  With only a slight strain, I pulled the lever down, and felt my stomach rise into my throat as I plummeted to the uncertain future below