**** Elysium 1986 ****

Abigail turned with quick strides toward the stairs to return to their reserved cabin when, some distance away, she saw a man emerge from a room with a security door. He was wearing a bulletproof vest over a white shirt. On his belt was a holster with a pistol, and over his shoulder was a shotgun, the barrel of which had been sawed off to a manageable length for maximum damage at close range. The programmer paused. Of course, all the guards on the ship were undoubtedly armed, but so far she had never seen anyone walking around so obviously heavily armed. The man had not yet spotted her, and she took the opportunity to quickly hide in the recess of a nearby door. Holding her breath, she peered out and watched as the man carefully closed the door and walked in the other direction. As he turned the next corner, something flashing fell from his pocket to the floor. Abigail rubbed the bridge of her nose excitedly, thinking. She should be going into the cabin now to prepare the others for their imminent escape, but her scalp was positively tingling with curiosity.
“Ah, screw it…” she whispered to herself as she walked over to where the object had fallen from the guard’s pocket and carefully picked it up. It was a key attached to a small metal ring, which also had a few strands of black cloth attached to it. She desperately wished she had some disinfectant with her, for no one could know who had held this key before. Her lips curled at the thought. Probably the key ring had caught on the outer edge of the bag and that was why it had fallen out again. With a quick glance, she made sure no one was watching her in the hallway. Then she crept over to the security door, put the key in the lock with her heart pounding, and turned it. Cautiously, she opened it and peered inside. It was too dark to see much, but the not too large room seemed to contain a few shelves where smaller bags and other items were stored. Suddenly she heard several voices and fast footsteps. A gun was locked and loaded, then a short radio message echoed through the hallway. What now? There was no way she could be caught opening what was clearly a restricted room. Beads of sweat formed on her forehead. Should she just close it and move on? But then she would never know what was inside. This terrible curiosity would one day take her to her grave. She pulled the key out of the lock, jumped into the room and pulled the door shut from the inside. Not a second too late, she heard heavy footsteps outside. Her heart pounding, she held the key in her clenched fist. It was pitch black and she began to feel the walls to the left and right of the door, finally finding a light switch and flipping it on. The chamber was about four square meters, with shelves reaching up to the ceiling. The bags, which Abigail could barely make out from the outside, were obviously bulging with cocaine. In fact, she was not too surprised to find such a stash. It could have been worth millions of dollars. Maybe it was Dexter’s private stash? But what had the guard been doing here? She continued to look around and discovered, in addition to a couple of guns and a box of ammunition, a square, very futuristic looking burgundy box about the size of two shoeboxes. The edges were rounded and on the front was a silver symbol with eight circles connected by lines of equal length. The symbol emitted a faint pulsating light. Was it a bomb, perhaps? she thought, then shook her head. Why would Dexter keep a bomb on the ship? The box probably weighed six or seven kilograms and was slightly warm when she pulled it from the shelf. She guessed it was made of some kind of hard plastic. Only then did she discover that there were many different cable connectors built into the back of it. There was also a round power button with the symbol from the front repeated on it. Her eyes began to light up; it was most likely a computer. However, she had never seen a model like this before. It seemed so different from the bulky gray or nicotine-yellow boxes she was used to. She couldn’t leave it behind, she thought, clutching the computer like a Christmas present she’d just received. Just then, she heard muffled gunshots and shouts in the distance, and more footsteps approaching from outside. Damn it! Hastily, she put the computer back on the shelf and locked the door from the inside.
Yuri threw open the door and jumped into the cabin. In his hand was the sword he had grabbed from Dexter’s wall. Both he and the blade were covered in blood splatters. Yanny looked at him, startled. She had just put on a robe and was also covered in blood from the operation. The bed and carpet were in no better condition. There was a hand-sized, freshly stitched wound on her stomach.
“What happened here?” exclaimed Yuri, startled to see her like this.
“I’m fine, it was just…” she started to explain as Harry came out of the bathroom, staggering slightly. He had just finished washing his hands. He was still wearing the clothes from the last fight. Both they and his hands were drenched in blood.
“Yuri? What happened to your face? What’s going on, why do you have a sword in your hand? Did you deal with Dexter?” he asked him, and then had to hold on to the bedpost for a moment to keep from falling over. Yuri, on the other hand, just pointed in the direction of the hallway.
“Yeah, got nipple at Dexter’s BDSM party. Big shit coming!” he yelled.
“You know, I really hate it when you say that…” Harry gasped, trying once again to summon all his strength. If he collapsed now, it could end in disaster.
“Where’s Baby Owl? Should be here by now?!” Yuri asked nervously, looking around.
“She wasn’t here! I hope nothing has happened to her,” Yanny blurted out in dismay.
“Maybe she had to go down already?” asked Yuri, slamming the cabin door from the inside. Moments later, screams were heard and several people were running along the corridor outside. “We have to get out of here, fast! If they find us here, it’s the end!”
“Where are we going?” Harry asked.
“Down to the lifeboat! Abigail said we use it to escape and row to shore,” Yuri explained quickly.
“All right,” Harry confirmed, nodding to Yanny. Yuri immediately yanked the door open again and took a quick look around.
“Now go, move legs!” he grunted, and then started running towards the stairs. People started screaming. The giant had run through a group of guests, sword in hand. Panic spread and many scurried through the corridors or hid in their rooms. Even the approaching guards with drawn weapons could not keep track of the situation in the growing commotion, causing even more fear among the passengers. Harry and Yanny followed as best they could, hurrying down the stairs together. One level below, they made their way to the lifeboats.
“Abigail’s not here!” Yanny exclaimed in horror after looking around for a moment. “We can’t leave without her!”
“There he is, and the other two are with him! Stop them!” a voice shouted from the direction of the boats.
Yuri turned on his heel and ran back inside and toward the stairs, the others close behind. Fortunately for them, other passengers ran toward them, preventing the guards from opening fire. Arriving at the stairs, Harry held on to the railing for a moment and took a deep breath. He felt as if everything around him was spinning. It wouldn’t take much to make him throw up, but he was startled again when he heard a long scream from above. It was Abigail, running down the stairs at great speed. She must have taken her shoes off somewhere so she could run better. She was carrying a red, expensive-looking box.
“To the lifeboats, damn it!” she shouted to her comrades.
“Don’t work, it’s all full of guards!” Yuri yelled back, waving at her.
“Then… just go further down!” she shouted, her voice slightly desperate, and ran down the stairs another floor.
“But down there… isn’t that the engine room?” Yanny asked.
“Freeze!” one of the guards yelled from behind, pushing aside an older man who had gotten in his way during the chase.
“Let’s go!” Harry gasped, and the three of them immediately set off after Abigail. After only a few steps, however, Harry threw up on the stairs, immediately forcing himself to keep running. On the lowest floor, the way to the stern was blocked by a heavy security door. Behind this door must have been the ship’s engine, which was roaring at some volume. The only way left was in the direction of the bow. There was also a door in this direction, but it was open. A few smoked cigarettes, empty plastic bottles and other leftovers gave the impression that until recently there had been guards here who had been called up in a hurry. From the stairs above, they could hear a loud thump as one of their pursuers slipped on the stain left by Harry and crashed down the stairs several meters. The TRAP team kept running, swiftly closing the door behind them to buy as much time as possible. Yuri managed to persuade Abigail to give him the computer to carry and she reluctantly handed it over, while Yanny took the sword in return. Harry still had his hands full trying to stay on his feet. As they continued to follow the narrow passage through an airlock toward the bow of the ship, a big surprise awaited them. The front underbelly of the giant yacht carried a small submarine about five meters long, held in place by two enormous grappling arms inside an armored glass dome. The dome itself was open to the water at the bottom to allow the boat to be released from the yacht. The submarine’s boarding hatch closed upward to an entrance in the dome. On the walls were various machines to control the mechanism of the grappling arms.
“Squad, into the sub!” Yuri ordered, running to the hatch and climbing in with the burgundy computer in his arms without even waiting for his companions to react.
“Um… do any of us know how to operate a submarine?” Abigail asked. Her and Harry’s eyes drifted to Yanny, who smiled in response.
“I can try…” she said, nodding.
“Wonderful, that’s good enough for me,” Abigail replied and ran to the hatch as well. Harry also made it into the submarine with Yanny’s help and immediately fell asleep on one of the seats in the cramped interior.
“Now what?” exclaimed Abigail nervously. They heard the airlock door being forced open from outside and orders being shouted. Yanny searched the control panel and thought. Then she seemed to have found what she was looking for. She opened a small flap containing a plug, grabbed it and used it to pull a long cable out of the panel. Then she brushed her hair aside and, with a quick tug, pushed the plug into a small socket at the back of her head. Her violet eyes began to glow slightly and she smiled.
“Much better, everything goes much faster this way,” she said. A second later, the submarine’s access hatch closed as if by magic, and the grappler arms holding the boat opened, releasing it into the depths of the sea. The engine started, a red light came on, and they picked up speed. Abigail had gone pale as she watched Yanny jam the cable into the back of her head.
“Now I remember why I never wanted to get a driver’s license,” she muttered.

Categorized as: Novel 2 (EN) | Novel Chapter (EN)

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