Coffee Cup Dreams (A Redpoint One Romance) (20 page)

The light-show above them disappeared as a
surge of doubts returned. What was she really doing? Did she know?
A simple Earth girl who had never been off the planet, and now
standing on the outside of an alien space station hull with a
deadly fight going on above her head, and she thought she knew what
needed to be done?

Yet she did. She knew she was right, right
down to her core.

"Yes, I know what to do. I'll take a few of
the bots with me and more raw materials. We're close to getting the
defense systems up. Trust me."

She realized when he smiled that she'd been
holding her breath, waiting to see how he would react. "As am I.
Rachel, we're heading to the south block relay. Time to get power
back into this section."

"You sure about that, Boss?" Rachel asked,
staring at them through the front window of the maintenance
pod.

Still looking at Tess, Arthur smiled. "I'm
sure. Tish, there are other warbots in there. Don't take any
chances."

"Which is why I'm taking other
bots."

He nodded. "I won't stop you. Just… come
back."

She nodded, her throat suddenly tight. With no
more time to think about it, she grabbed the arm Crimson held out.
"Get me to the closest East airlock as fast as you can."

A bright flash, followed by two more, hit the
station somewhere nearby. With it came a shouted order from control
to find cover.

As she moved away she kept her eyes averted
from Arthur and Rachel. She needed to concentrate. She knew what
she needed to do, but the knowledge felt tenuous, as if it might
slip out of her mental grasp in an instance if she wasn't
careful.

Crimson swung around a series of barrel-shapes
rising up from the hull. The action in the sky became a blur as the
bot increased speed. Again she felt the rumbles, the shifts in the
hull even though her feet were no longer resting on
anything.

The station was getting battered in the
fire-fight. The few patrol ships and the small weapons from the
freighter were nowhere near enough to take on the sheer numbers of
pirate ships. In her ear she could hear first Arthur and then the
Station control center announce new pirate arrivals.

The freighter was as good as taken soon. And
perhaps the station? Did the pirates want Redpoint One? It would be
a huge prize as well as a home base from which they could wreak
havoc among both the inner and outer worlds of the Galactic
Commonwealth.

She caught a glimpse of a dark-hulled pirate
ship as it flew over her. It strafed the surface, causing
explosions of sparks and smoke to erupt from the space
station.

No, the station wasn't in danger of invasion,
at least not yet. There were too many people to fight on the
inside. But, she had no doubt the pirates were willing to cause
enough damage that it might be a possibility in the
future.

At the thought she grew angry. A treasure to
the humans, an irreplaceable representation of a long-gone alien
species, and the pirates were showing no respect for it. Did they
really think the station or the bots would accept them as new
masters?

They would be in for a very nasty
surprise.

It was with a good head of steam that they
arrived at the airlock Tish wanted. She set her feet down on the
hull, motioning Crimson to the controls. By the time the outer door
into the airlock opened a swarm of bots converged on
her.

"Tish, where are you? Are you alright?" Arthur
called. "Pirate fire is getting intense."

"I'm in the airlock," Tish announced as she
stepped inside and righted her self with the room.

"And we're at the south relay. Power will be
in your section soon. Be ready for it," Arthur answered back. "Get
away from the outer hull if you can. We nearly got hit up
here."

"Got it."

As the swarm of bots arrived she reached out
the airlock door to drag one of the warbots inside. Again, a
feeling of revulsion filled her at the touch. Things made for only
war didn't have a place on the station. It felt wrong to bring it
back inside.

She shoved the feeling aside. She only needed
what they were made of, not what they were designed for.

The other bots each grabbed parts of the other
warbot, dragging it after her. Crimson had the airlock cycled and
the inner door opened within seconds. With bots on all sides, she
moved inside the station. The narrow corridors with piping and
hatches told her she was in one of the maintenance
areas.

Perfect.

She stopped at a three-way juncture. One would
be a safer way to get to the place needing repair. She glanced
around at the shadows and twists and turns in all directions. Any
of them could be hiding lurking warbots. She'd noticed how quiet
her bots were.

No, now was not the time for 'safe.' Now was
the time for action and speed, to get the repairs done as soon as
possible. That meant the turn to the corridor on the
right.

The moment she did, she felt nervous. The
corridor was almost completely black. The piping turned smaller,
weaving in and out of the walls and ceiling, then down into the
floor in regular intervals. Then into tighter intervals.

The blackened portions told her there had been
plenty of explosions and fire in the area, but the piping appeared
intact. One of the bots zipped in front of her, light coming from
its eyes to light her way. It was barely bright enough for her to
see the floor a short distance away from her feet, but it was
enough.

Enough for her to see they were passing by
several bulkheads of a thickness she'd not seen before.
Instinctively she knew they should be closed and tightly sealed. To
protect the conduits and relay junctures, the modules and control
phase distorters.

She almost stumbled over the clunky boots. The
last item had just popped into her head, the exact name for it, and
she really had no idea what it was or what it meant or what it
did.

The bot in front of her continued straight on,
but she paused at a turn. No, not that way of the bot, she needed
to go the other. Straight to the source of the problem. The bots
might be uncomfortable with her in the area, but the station
over-ruled the bots.

Her legs ached from the heavy boots and the
rest of the spacesuit. She really should have taken the thing off,
but that would have used up valuable time. Time she had a sinking
feeling they were running out of.

The bots spun around to follow her, letting
out soft questioning chirps. She didn't speak to reassure them. She
needed to pay attention to where she needed to turn.

She almost missed it. The entrance into a
narrow corridor was masked in the shadows and the twists and turns
of the weaving conduits and pipes. She had to jostle the warbot to
get it to fit into the claustrophobic opening. The bots ended up
welding an arm off the second one to make it fit
through.

Tish didn't stop and wait for them to catch
up. She knew they would eventually.

Suddenly she was in the place. A place of
nooks and crannies, odd shapes and piping and conduits connecting
it all.

None of the overhead lighting worked, allowing
her to see very little of the area. The space closed in on her,
compressing her even without touching. Yet, she could feel life
around her. It just needed a little help to function
properly.

Finding the problem area was easy. It was the
wall cratered and scorched. Miniature and even smaller bots ran
across the conduits, repairing them as they went.

The big crater was the problem. She lifted the
warbot, trying to balance it upright. But, no matter how she turned
or adjusted it she knew it would be too big.

Did she really want to stick a nearly whole
warbot into any part of this area? What would happen if any of the
internal self-repair systems were still functional?

"Crimson, take off its head. Spot, the arms.
You, the striped one, take off the hovering pads from the
bottom."

The bots went to work, the flashes of lasers
and welding flames illuminating the tiny space. The rest of the
bots arrived, and after conferring with the bots working on Tish's
warbot, went to work dismembering the other warbot.

Tish grabbed the parts as soon as they came
free. She stopped with an upper arm in her hand, looking over the
damaged area. What should she do now? Take things apart further?
What portion needed the raw materials the most? Dozens of tiny bot
eyestalks stopped to watch her from their perches along the wall
and damaged area, waiting on her.

She took a deep breath. Time to stop thinking.
Time to go with instinct.

Tish closed her eyes, taking several deep
breaths. Calming the fear and thoughts racing through her head. She
listened to the station around her. To the feeling of life and
activity.

When she opened her eyes she knew what to
do.

She stuffed the arm along a deep cavity
between two pipes. Miniature bots swarmed over it. Part of the head
went into a blown out area where a relay once would have
been.

Again and again she grabbed parts and pushed
and stuffed them into any place the instincts told her it should
go. Crimson and the other bots barely kept ahead of her.

The narrow area didn't allow for much space,
and yet she managed to keep from tripping or stepping on any bots.
Almost as if in a silent dance, all of them moved in precise
movements, moving around one another, over and under each
other.

No questioning the feelings. Just
doing.

And the doing felt good. More miniature bots
appeared from holes and cavities in the wall and ceiling. Some of
the bots who'd come with her left to join in with the small bots,
their backs sprouting with arms and tools as they attacked the
repairs.

As she stuffed half the main body of a warbot
deep into a nook, the walls around her seemed to almost reach out
for the bot. She pulled back, but in the deep shadows she couldn't
tell if it might have been her imagination.

Another urge. She ripped off her helmet and
let it drop to the floor. A bot scurried away with it further into
the area. The belt followed, then the boots. Each article
disappeared into another direction. She had a feeling no one would
ever see the suit again.

Free of the cumbersome spacesuit, she rushed
from one part to another, helping to move raw materials, push or
hold parts into position, urge the bots into more important
areas.

The larger bots froze, all their eyestalks
swiveling around back the way they'd come. Tish froze, feeling the
hair at the back of her neck standing straight up. The feeling of
being watched, the certainty of danger.

With her heart in her mouth, Tish swiveled
around.

The red glowing eyes of a warbot pinpointed
the source of their concern. A glow growing brighter with each
second as the warbot approached.

CHAPTER
EIGHTEEN

ARTHUR DIDN'T BOTHER taking off his helmet once he was in the
pod with Rachel. No point in it.

"Incoming," Rachel shouted, twisting the pod
down towards the hull in a dare-devil maneuver that had him
wondering if she intended to ram them into it. He grabbed at the
edges of the seat.

She pulled up at the last minute, leveling off
to speed across the hull of Redpoint One with only a hand-span of
clearance. Behind them a series of strafing explosions erupted from
the hull as a pirate ship flew past.

"Who taught you to drive?" Arthur demanded as
the ship disappeared around the curve of the station.

"We're alive, aren't we?"

Arthur worked to catch his breath. "We can't
stay out here. We're going to get shot down."

"Then you're in luck. Relay ahead."

Never before had Arthur been so happy to see
the rounded bulb of a power relay before in his life, despite how
difficult and dangerous they were to work on. Even better was the
large airlock just next to it. More than big enough for the entire
maintenance pod to slip inside.