After laying low for several minutes more, Zel set his eyes on his prize.  One discarded engineering suit with safety helmet laying unceremoniously in a heap nearby a matter recycler.  Perhaps at another time and place he might look back and be amused at the laughably poor excuse for a prize, but for the moment someone else’s stinky laundry was a rock-solid disguise.  Hallway clear?  Move, snatch, hide.  Ugh, it ~did~ stink.  But by now Zel’s nose knew not to complain when his life was on the line.  Besides, his ribs were starting to complain more vehemently than his nose could ever dream of, even besting the jagged cuts on his fingers for attention.  Somewhere in the back of his mind Zel noted that he should probably get those looked at.  If and when he came across someone with any sort of medical expertise who didn’t want to see him in jail, dead or as their own personal lab rat.  In Zel’s lifetime such doctors were few and far between.

Smell notwithstanding the suit fit reasonably well, and as soon as Zel fixed the helmet on he found himself looking like a short but convincing engineer.  Well, that was so long as he kept move.  Slipping out from his hiding place, he bee-lined for a junction made a crisp turn, and entered into the stream of foot traffic that would take him to the far cargo bay on the other side of the station.

If he was young and cavalier, he would have turned around and headed back for his Triton Runner, to see if he could slip past the security and the clean-up crew, jerry rig his own shuttle and slip out in the dead of night when everybody was least expecting it.  Except as soon as he made his escape they would know he had, in fact survived and he would be on the run with even more vehemence than he was now.  No, age told him to take the safer option of smuggling himself out in a likely load of cargo.  And so, he took off down the corridor with his head down just enough to not catch anyone in the eye.

Almost anyone.

His breath caught in his throat as he felt the urge to look up.  He found himself staring directly into the face of a man he was quite sure was dead.  It was moments like these that Zel Rohan wondered just what he had done to make the universe hate him so much.  He did a double-take just to make sure.  Sel Armarian, the Denevian first officer of the Annabelle’s Lament. Oddly not blown up alongside the Captain and the cargo.

Even worse, the man fixed Zel with a look right back and smiled.  Smiled.  A wide shit-eating grin from ear to ear before he kept right on walking.

Rohan knew he should keep on going.  He knew he should ignore his own confounded curiosity, it had already gotten him into too much trouble.  He knew it was a bad idea to trail the man.

But he was already making the 180, his feet not listening to his brain.  Sel Armarian slipped into a side corridor and languidly made his way towards a maintenance bay in the sort of easy stroll that said he didn’t have a care in the galaxy.  Inwardly Zel had a monologue of cursing his own foolishness that he couldn’t quite cancel out.  And yet his feet kept on following.

Even more irritatingly enough, Armarian was moving just slowly enough that it seemed he wanted to be followed.  It was dead simple to trace his tracks all the way into a massive storage bay, and then suddenly the trail went cold and the Denevian disappeared into the darkness

Well, crap.

As he was wont to do when such things happened, Zel hit the deck and rolled into cover before anything could be thrown or fired at him.  That’s when he heard the chuckling.

“You got good reflexes.  No wonder they didn’t get you yet.”

Zel cautiously peered out from his cover and frowned.  “Who is they and who are you?”

“You know who I am…”

“You signed the shipment order.  Armarian.”

“Yes, you can call me that.”  The Denevian’s face appeared several shelves away, smiling.

The little hybrid narrowed his eyes.  “Why play this game?  If you’re going to kill me, then let’s have an honest shoot out.”

Again, the chuckle resonated through the empty bay.  “Oh, my dear Mr. Rohan, I very much do not want to kill you.”

“You don’t?”  He couldn’t even begin to keep the incredulity from his voice.

“No.”  Armarian moved several steps forward, his hands up in the air where Zel could see they were empty.  “Funny enough I don’t like the Syndicate as much as you do. That goes double for the Syndicate terrorists who bombed the Annabelle’s Lament.”

“You knew the Lament was bombed?”

The Denevian nodded slowly.  “I knew it was targeted, but I didn’t know how they would do it until after it blew up.  I stayed back on the station to do some”  he coughed “‘research’ – going to catch up with the Lament by shuttle later on, but they beat me to the punch.”

“Why?”

“Oh, there are a world of reasons, Mr. Rohan.  Far more than you should worry about.  The question you should be asking now isn’t why… it is ‘how?’”

Zel blinked.  “Ok… how?”

In reply, Armarian produced a small vial from his sleeve like a stage magician and tossed it towards him.  Zel jumped, nearly shot the thing in midair, but curiosity won out and he caught the thing with his gloved hand, staring at it as if it were going to bite him.

Slowly Zel rotated it in his chubby pleather covered fingers, looking at the alien markings and the odd, fluorescent substance within.

“I’ve never seen anything like it.”

“That’s because nothing like it exists in the known galaxy.” Armarian offered an irritatingly know-it-all sort of grin. “At least not yet.”

Wrapping his fingers around the vial, Zel looked up, perturbed. “How can it be here in my hands if it isn’t in the known galaxy.”

“People only know what they take the time to notice.” The Denevian’s tone was chiding.

Zel narrowed his eyes. “Then where does it come from?”

“Underspace.”

The little hybrid shook his head. He had never heard of such a thing. “What is under space?”

“It’s not under as in hiding under a table. It’s a vast network of subspace corridors with hitherto unmined resources.” Armarian offered.  “And unencountered dangers. I expect this sector will become rather … boisterous… in the next few weeks.”

“That sounds like a threat.” Zel surmised, wishing he hadn’t let his curiosity get the best of him and that he hadn’t started this conversation.

Armarian shook his head. “It isn’t. It’s a warning. The blackout isn’t unique, and it isn’t coincidental.”

Maybe he wasn’t smart enough, or maybe his brain was too tired, but Zel could not put all the pieces of this puzzle together. “And this little vial is a product of the blackouts and is somehow also enough to blow up a freighter? You can’t be serious.”

“Oh, quite serious.  Though I understand there is a bit of engineering involved to produce a really decent bang. And yes, the blackouts, the subspace eddies and the sudden rise in the popularity of Space Dust? Well unless you’re paranoid they could all be coincidental.  Still… food for thought, no?”  Armarian grinned.

Zel was extremely paranoid, and his ears perked up, as his brain raced to try to figure out the connections and put everything together.

“Why tell me this?”

“Oh, I think it will be important later on when we see each other again.” The Denevian leaned back, speaking with a matter-of-fact tone.

The little hybrid perked a brow ridge.  “We’re going to see each other again?”

“Oh, most likely.  Make sure you take care you yourself between now and then,” Armarian shook a finger at him.  “Don’t get yourself killed.”

“Oh, I don’t intend to…” Zel replied, before adding honestly, “I don’t trust you.”

“I probably wouldn’t trust me either if I were you.” Armarian winked back.  “Either way, I can help you and you can help me.  And I’ll give you more details on how and why when we see each other again.  But for now, I’d suggest heading towards Cargo Bay three, there’s a ship there loading Kriosian silks, due to take off within the next two hours. Headed for Mireya VII.  If you hurry, you can make it.”

Zel grit his teeth and gave Armarian a nod.  He didn’t like the man, or not knowing what was going on – didn’t like it one bit.  But the suggestion was solid.  Kriosian silks needed to ‘breathe’ and therefore the containers they were shipped in were both climate controlled and had a fresh supply of oxygen pumped through them continually.  They were a perfect way to smuggle oneself off a station full of people who wanted to kill you.

Though he made sure he never turned his back to Armarian until he was far out of range of every beam weapon imaginable.

~*~

Well, he had traveled in worse conditions.

For whatever that was worth, it was the thing Zel Rohan was hanging on to.  Certainly he had traveled in better conditions as well – something that kept cropping into his head every time he moved and his body ached or the cold sunk in.  But all in all, smuggling oneself in a silk crate was not the worst thing in the universe.

He had made sure to jerry-rig the lock so he could open it from the inside.  It left a solid escape hatch for everything from ‘I have been discovered, and I need to run!’ to ‘I really gotta pee…’  Though he admitted he had been more motivated to get up and stretch his legs several times a day – at least at the start ot the trip he stuck to a steady schedule.

Now several days in, the solid ache of cracked ribs and punished muscles groaned with a nagging insistence.  Zel was spending most of his time in a drowsy half-sleep, and the truly awake times were spent trying to talk himself out of getting up and moving.

Yeah, there had been better times.

There had also been worse.

Zel wasn’t one to dwell on the worse.  He found the moment he started thinking about it, was also the moment when the universe reared its ugly head and decided that worse was about to happen.  So far being dead was working out for him pretty well. Nobody should be looking for him, especially not on a trading ship hauling fine whiskies and silks. Too bad he couldn’t crack open one of those whiskey crates.

He rubbed his temples and popped the lid of his cargo crate. Stretching gingerly, he pulled himself up into a sitting position and stared around the darkened cargo bay.  It was chilly enough outside to make his breath frost over and his teeth chatter.  If he was going to get out and do things, he had better do them quickly before he became a popsicle.  The first bits were routine.  Find water, fill canteen, make water in an appropriate location, make sure all bits were attached and not falling off, the usual.

Then enough of a walk to keep his joints moving, but not so much of a walk that he froze solid. This was his routine, trying to keep to a contained route so that the cargo scanners on the La Boheme didn’t detect their stowaway. Thank goodness this civilian freighter was high on the cargo space and low on the tech.

So far, several days in, things had been pretty mundane. But his conversation with Armarian still sat uncomfortably in his brain. What was underspace? How were the blackouts connected?

Every once in a while, the crew of the La Boheme would check or shift the cargo, and he heard one of them talking about a Vohd-whoar, or Vaudh-where or something like that. Zel didn’t have the slightest clue what they were talking about, but apparently these Vod-whatevers were attacking freighters, which sounded…

Awful.

He would pray to the Prophets to keep this ship safe but decided that was a surefire way to get the La Boheme attacked. Zel was pretty sure the Prophets hated him.

He should go back to his crate and hide. But as he walked, he could start to hear things from the belly of the La Boheme. Was that an alert? Or an alarm? There was exactly one viewing port in this entire cargo bay and it was up on the third floor.

And one cold, rickety metallic ladder leading up. This was probably a bad idea.

And yet here his hands were on the rungs, ascending.

One story, two… by the time he hit the third his hand ached from the beating they had taken on Quastris. Actually, just about every bone in Zel’s body ached, but his curiosity outweighed the pain. Climbing one stack of cargo crates he made it to the viewing port just in time to watch a brown, blobby assault vessel strafe the La Boheme, spitting disruptors at the ship.

Shit.

The cargo pitched as the La Boheme took a sharp turn and bucked from weapons fire.  Zel’s scabbed over hands scrabbled for purchase on any surface he might be able to brace against. Of course, if any ship would get itself into trouble, it would certainly be the one he was on.

His brain was willing, but his body was weak. As the La Boheme enacted evasive maneuvers, the cargo shifted sending Zel flying off with a haphazard crash landing in the corner. Which was marginally better than getting flung off the third-floor balcony – so maybe the Prophets didn’t hate him entirely. Though he would be more inclined to believe they still hated him but merely found more amusement with keeping him alive.

He landed hard and screwed his eyes shut, wincing at the light and the flash of pain through his gut, swearing the entire time.  “Next time I think to myself ‘self, don’t do this…’ why don’t I actually listen to myself?” he muttered darkly, staggering to find his feet.

As he slid back down the ladder a low red flash illuminated the cargo bay, followed by the dark whine of a red alert, and followed by the most colorful swearing Zel could think up.  He pressed a hand to his aching side and ran as fast as his little legs would let him, diving for cover back into his silk crate, clenching his chattering teeth to keep them quiet.

The hiss of the crate’s environmental systems drown out the alarms and pure darkness set in. His mind raced, panic starting to sink in. Were these the Vadwhooeys? It didn’t look like a Syndicate ship, but if Vanobio Saan figured out he was still alive… he would rather take his chances with the Vaad-whatevers.

The trading ship banked hard to starboard, pressing Zel up against the wall of the crate as the whole stack of cargo grated against its holding straps.  He groaned, pinching the bridge of his nose and wondering what the heck was going on.  The only saving grace of this horrible situation is the silks needed to be kept at a standard temperature with airflow, so the crate has its own internal environmental system.

He was certainly going to owe someone for this crate of silks… but at this point if he made it through with his life he might offer the Prophets a bit of credit.

Outside, the La Boheme ran for its life, while inside, in the dark, sealed in a silk crate, Zel prayed to any divine power that might listen.

Would any of them listen?

Only time would tell.