Welcome to Percotran -Part XIX

By Richard Davidson

Kasheeba was dreaming. She was back on her home island once again. Huaii Fijisumatra was the biggest of all the islands in the world, and it never stayed in one place very long. It had to keep moving, or Percotran International, or one of the other corporations might find it. If that ever happened, the people would be wiped out, or worse, processed through Human Resources.

“They take your soul, and use it for target practice,” the Elders would warn. In those days, Kasheeba thought the Elders fools, who didn’t understand the real world. Now, seeing their wisdom was as easy as killing any three men, which really wasn’t much of a challenge to Kasheeba.

In the dream, she had been searching for a Japaner, who didn’t speak her language, and had a mysterious name. The Seven Spirits were all around Kasheeba, and they were whispering to her. They were telling her she must find him.

When Kasheeba was approaching adulthood, she had believed the Japaner’s name, Kirisuwa, was of great importance. It had some kind of meaning for Kasheeba, and she had always wanted so badly to find this meaning, but she had never found Kirisuwa; never found Japania; in fact she would never even find Huaii Fijisumatra again, and would spend many years searching for it.

In her dream, the Seven Spirits lifted her onto the wind, and she flew across the great realm of Oceania, the wind blowing in her dark, silky hair. The flying part of the dream seemed to last forever, and then it was over far too soon.

Suddenly, without ever landing, she was in Japania, and excitedly asking a native about Kirisuwa.

“Kirisuwa?” asked the woman, confused.

Kasheeba was ready to draw her sword, and threaten the woman, but the Seven Spirits told her not to. The woman ran towards a small village, shouting “Kirisuwa, Kirisuwa!”

She fell exhausted in a heap, in front of a wooden building. Small; simple; and yet beautiful in it’s workmanship, it was like nothing Kasheeba had seen. A man in a long robe approached the woman, and laying his hands tenderly on her head, looked intently at Kasheeba.

“I must find Kirisuwa,” Kasheeba explained breathlessly, and the man had the same look of confusion that had adorned this woman’s face only minutes ago.

He ran into the building, which was a temple of some sort, and emerged with a small dog. He began to sing, and the Seven Spirits began to sing as well, and before Kasheeba could join in, a wind was starting to pick her up, to take her back out over the water.

“So Kirisuwa means ‘Small Spaniel,’” Kasheeba thought, in a disappointed funk. The Seven Spirits began laughing furiously, and then she was awake.

It had been several days since Captain Pearson went above deck, and for that entire time, she, Wilson, (much to his displeasure,) and Swig had been working to open the hatches. They would both like very much to know if the good Captain was still alive, or if they had a killer Security Robot loose up there.

Hours after the Captain had disappeared above deck, they had approached the task methodically; first attempting to access the ship’s computer for the better part of the day. They did access it, but it continually denied them any interfaces that were related to security, failing to recognize Kasheeba’s clearance, which was about as high as it got.

They worked continually, until they started falling asleep at the console, and then Wilson had to be locked in an old iron cage, as all the holding rooms were also locked under Security Protocol 3. There’s no need to describe the fuss he put up here.

On the second day, they had nearly killed themselves, quite a few different ways.

Swig had attempted to open Hatch 5 by cutting into it with a Fragmation 1200 Laser Torch. Hatch 5 had an outer layer of polished Celudrite, which was bad enough, but the next two inches were Byrillium X, which can handle heat up to roughly .009 Suns, and deflected the beam back at Swig, cutting his hat in two as he leapt to the ground in fear.

As he lay there, the small scar he’d made on the Celudrite healed itself, and three hours of work instantly disappeared.

As a child, Swig had never cried. He’d always been considered completely devoid of emotion, but his frustration made the tears come flowing, much to the alarm of Kasheeba.

“Hey, don’t fall apart on me now,” she cautioned, “the Captain may be alive up there, and we’re going up, one way or another.”

Swig was truly moved by her gutsy determination, and considered giving her a big hug, and then he remembered Snakehead’s rapid exit from this world at the flick of her sword.

“What’s that?” he asked, as Kasheeba stuck some wires into the goop she’d been injecting into the tiny space between the hatch and the door.

“Plastic explosives,” she answered.

Swig had never heard of such a thing.

“Huh?” he asked, incredulous. “What’s plastic?”

“Plastic is a generic term for almost every kind of material used today. It’s an ancient term, that means ‘Smooth and Shiny.’”

He never would know how anybody could be so smart.

“And that’s a detonator?” he indicated the detonator in her hand.

“Shouldn’t we take cover?” he thought to ask, and then didn’t, instead just doing it, by crouching behind a steel table.

Kasheeba noticed his scuffling, and thought “coward,” and then did the same thing. She pushed the button on the detonator, and the explosion shot flame all the way to the walls of the room, blew out the door into the galley, and melted the tables they were hiding behind just enough to make the room look like a Salvador Dahli painting.

The Plutonic Acid didn’t work out too well, either; nor did the ship to air missile they tried on Hatch 2, making a hole in the stern the size of the helicopter it was designed to take down, and having no effect on the hatch whatsoever. They were lucky to be so far above the waterline, but they were still no closer to getting above deck.

On the third day, they had spent the morning trying a new idea on the ship’s computer, only to be denied all access; even to secondary systems, which was a real problem, considering they were on computer control, and couldn’t steer manually, not to mention the lockdown of the only food freezer that actually contained food.

That afternoon, Kasheeba had crawled out of the hole in the stern, and tried to scale her way up to the deck, but the external security grid was still live, and she burnt her hands and arms before she could jump, bash her head on the hull, and drag herself back aboard.

Swig had done an excellent job of wrapping her hands, and dressing her wounds, and she was looking less like a ruthless Pirate, and more like a convalescent ward patient.

“Better check on Wilson,” she thought, and made her way to the storage room he was caged up in. Swig was asleep, doing a wonderful job of guarding their costly prize, and Wilson was sitting calmly, reading a book about True Power.

“I take it you haven’t gotten above deck yet,” he said glibly.

“I should kill you now,” she answered testily, and he laughed softly.

“Maybe I can help you,” he said, with a grin.

He didn’t wear the grin for long, because Kasheeba quickly undid the locks, pulled him out of the cage with one bandaged hand, and held him with the point of her sword pressed against his neck.

“You’ve been sitting there LAUGHING at us, knowing how to get above deck?” she asked, her eyes bulging wildly.

“I didn’t say I knew how to get above deck,” he barely got the words out.

“DO NOT TRIFLE WITH ME LITTLE MAN,” she bellowed in a voice that parted his hair, as she threw him into the wall, where he slid to the floor with a sick look on his face.

She stood over him, bandaged hands on hips, staring at him; burning into his soul.

“Look,” he said very, very timidly, “I’m just saying I have an idea, that’s all.”

“You will tell me this idea.”

“The ship’s computer isn’t letting us in, right?”

“Yes.”

“Well, why do you suppose that is?”

She looked at him contemptuously.

“Do you have an idea, or not?”

“C’mon, answer the question.”

“I don’t know why that is.” She was losing patience. She remembered what Alexander had said about this puny man not being worth much, and began to wonder if she should just go ahead and kill him, and be done with it.

“The Security Robot has interfaced with your ship’s computer, and now it has locked you out of all command functions.”

Kasheeba was sure she would kill him now, but not with her sword. She flung it to the ground, and began squeezing his neck with her burnt, bandaged hands.

“I don’t care about your idea, you useless little worm,” Kasheeba seethed. “The Captain is not dead!”

She began squeezing even harder, and Wilson’s eyes bulged from their sockets; his face turned red, and he felt the world swimming away from him.

“Kasheeba!”

It was Swig, who had burst through the door; his eyes filled with blind panic.

What he said next made her drop the debatably fortunate Wilson, whose larynx was damaged just a bit.

“The Captain is dead.”

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