The Tartarus Directive

Chapter 12

He woke a few hours later to the feeling of being jostled. He cracked his right eye to get a look. A man was hunched over him, beginning to rifle through his pockets.

"What have you got here?" the thief murmured.

Griff shut his eye and waited to see where the thief stuck his hand. He felt the man feel his way towards Griff's underarm holster and just before his hand landed on it, Griff opened his eyes wide, swung his arm around, and gripped the thief's wrist hard.

The thief reeled back and fell, pulling Griff with him onto the dusty floor. The thief swung his free fist wildly at Griff and landed a solid blow on Griff's left cheekbone. Griff released his grip and slumped back, giving the man just enough time to get to his feet and draw a shiv.

"Boys! Boys!" the thief hollered. "This fuckhead is tryin' to steal my shoes!"

The whole bunkhouse groaned to life and several men jumped down from their hammocks to see what the commotion was.

The thief lunged at Griff with the shiv, slashing violently. Griff rolled to one side and narrowly missed the blade's path. As soon as Griff could get back on his feet he felt a strong kick in his rear that sent him stumbling towards his blade-wielding attacker.

The thief slashed again and caught the edge of the blade on Griff's jacket sleeve, nicking his arm. Griff reached into his jacket to draw his gyrojet but was kicked again before he was able to point it. The gun went twirling through the air and landed in the middle of the floor with a heavy metal thud.

Shouts of "He's got a gun!" and "Kill 'em!" came from the gathering crowd of ruffians.

Griff dove for the gun but misjudged his trajectory and knocked it sliding across the floor instead. The thief took another stab at him and missed. Griff scrambled under a hammock towards the gun but an onlooker kicked it away as he moved out of Griff's path.

The thief pursued Griff through the rows of hammocks, clumsily hacking through them with his weapon instead of scrambling over and under. The jeering crowd maintained a perimeter around the battling men as they moved about the bunkhouse.

Griff finally reached the gun and trained it on the thief. The thief stopped in his tracks and dropped the shiv to the floor. Griff got to his feet, keeping the gun pointed squarely at the thief. The crowd became even more bloodthirsty, egging Griff on to pull the trigger.

"Section J, Section J," came over the loudspeaker. "All workers in Section J are to disperse immediately." The garbled voice was met with jeers and more chanting. "All workers in Section J are to disperse immediately," the loudspeaker repeated.

Griff turned the gun on the crowd and used its threat to part the sea of bodies. Once he was free of the Section J bunkhouse, he bolted down the corridors in no particular direction. He could hear the dozens of feet pounding the floor in pursuit. He came to a dead end and doubled back down a branching corridor.

These men had been stuck in the Hub for weeks with very little in the way of entertainment. Blood sport was their release and Griff had become their unwilling gladiator.

As fast as Griff could run, he was lost in the Hub's maze of corridors and modules and with every wrong turn or dead end his assailants gained ground. The mob knew every inch of this place by heart, and Griff's unfamiliarity only heightened his anxiety. He followed the signage as best he could but the blinding fear and his still-wounded body held him back.

He came to an open ventilation duct in the ceiling of a corridor near the docking bays. He clambered up into it and waited, suppressing his labored breathing as best he could to not make a sound. Seconds later the mob came roaring down the corridor beneath him and passed.