***

THE REST OF THE DAY went by without incident and when he eventually told Ely to eat her food, she sighed and did so. It was the only reaction he’d gotten out of her since that morning.

He was getting used to the day-to-day life of a prisoner, finding it somewhat charming.

Simplistic and terrorizing.

When the door reopened later that day he was ready for it, watching through the feeds outside his body as a different guard and android with provisions headed their way. As the food was handed out, he kept his mouth shut and his head down, knowing that it was almost time.

He counted down the seconds until the overhead lights dimmed, and he kept them going until they went out altogether. Until there were no more lights. Until an impenetrable darkness filled the space and covered his tracks from all prying eyes. He stifled all power to the brig.

He’d waited for the rest cycle to ensure as many of the roaming guards and crew were out of circulation to execute his plan. His eyes switched to night vision.

Silently, he rose and walked to his cell door, unlocked it, and stepped out. The murmuring, slightly panicked sounds of those around him only covered his tracks further.

Gunner tuned them out and kept moving, using their confusion before their senses shifted priority.

He lingered at the door exiting the brig, his hand outstretched...

Something stopped him from passing through.

He whiffed the cloistered stench and sought out the one smell that had come to comfort him in some small way.

Gunner turned on his heel and approached Ely’s cell. He stood outside her unit, watching her in the dark, wide-eyed and blinking, facing the direction of his own cage. His hand hovered over the lock, knowing he could open it, step in, do anything he wanted, and finally get the last damning evidence he needed, but once again his hand stilled.

Instead, the voices of the others rose around him, trying to penetrate his dark little world, their dark little world, and was reminded of the ever-ticking clock.

His eyes remained on Ely as she shifted warily about, eventually slinking over to the bars that joined their units. Gunner had no idea why she felt safer on his side over the middle, but the reason she stayed away from Kallan was obvious.

She didn’t need to move to him now, not while in the dark. It cloaked her like it did him. His hands clenched at his sides as her lips opened to speak. He smelled a tendril of fear. She exuded it. For some reason that bothered him.

Fuck!

He ducked back into his cell and crouched beside her.

“Shhh,” he whispered next to her ear, making her jump. “Power surge, it’ll be over soon,” he consoled. Ely regained her composure and settled back. He, on the other hand, had to forcibly stretch his fingers to release the strain in his tendons, knowing he could accidentally touch her. Their deal wouldn’t be disrupted by an accident. Right?

When did I become a saint? Gunner got back to his feet and scowled, refusing to spare his entertainment another glance. He resumed his mission and returned to the door, powering off the lights beyond before stepping through, unnoticed, and only questionable to those who thought they were hearing things.

He tried to alleviate some of the tension that had built in his frame, but the further he made his way into the ship, the worse it became.

Even keeping one part of himself shelled over the ship’s security, keeping the alarms from going off and replaying loops of previous feeds, helped little. His rationale demanded that he go back; his beast demanded he go back.

He extended the claws of his right hand and dug them into his palm. Clarity through pain.

Gunner pressed up against the wall as voices filled the hallway. They came from within an open door he needed to pass. Sniffing the air, although vented and sterilized, the sour tang of sweat, unease, and unwashed bodies filled his nose.

They weren’t the men he was looking for.

He was after a different target tonight.

“Captain says we’re headed for Elyria.”

“Bout’ time. I need something besides old steel and you guys to look at.”

He took in the information and crouched down, leaving his body to check the room’s feed. They weren’t facing his way. He zipped past. Their voices faded as he left them behind.

The hallway came to an end, to a small opening of disjointed parts, crates, and grease stains. On one side there was another corridor that he knew would lead him to the machine rooms and to the underbelly, the other way led to storage, but it was the elevator before him that would lead to the floor above where the crew’s quarters were housed.

He lowered and quietly took off his boots, slipping them behind one of the crates.

Gunner placed his hand on the elevator panel and forced its doors to open. Once he was shut away in the cramped space and moving up, the stink of the brig vanished. He gritted his teeth against the urge to go back to it, clawing new wounds into his palm.

The elevator opened a moment later to reveal the crew deck. The tension that howled at him before morphed into hungry, delicious, sweet anticipation.

He stepped into the slightly more lavish landing and cracked his neck. Everyone I’m looking for is here.

Gunner lifted his nose and took in another deep breath, sorting out what he needed and what he wanted. The captain is on the bridge. But Gunner wasn’t after him just yet and the bridge was on another floor entirely.

It took some time ducking in and out of rooms, longer than if he had waited until the rest cycle was at its deepest, but he kept his footsteps silent and his movements quiet. Although he could static up the feeds or replay the same previous minute on loop, he couldn’t hide the noise without it becoming suspicious.

Even an idiot could discern a sound pattern on replay.

The passageways crossed at several points and as he moved through the ship—which he was certain was some hybrid between a freighter and a badly re-fabricated weapons unit—he was surprised at how easy it was to navigate through the interior.

The tangy stench of badly crafted food and rehydrated vegetables—probably grown years prior—led him to a secluded room. The grated floors had smoothed out into pounded metal panels. Gunner closed his eyes and listened.

The static of a tele-feed and those of a man breathing quietly in a state of relaxation filled his ears. The electricity that flowed from within was strong and he soaked it up, letting it fill the currents throughout his body. He puffed out his chest, feeling his undershirt strain against his muscles.

There was a groan and a grunt. The power was no longer as thick and vibrant as before now that he’d fed off its stores. The voices on the tele-feed crackled, righted, and crackled again.

“Shit, stupid tech!”

Gunner heard the man get up and his eyes found the grey, almost gleaming metal wall across from him. The red of his eyes was smudged in the reflection looking back at him. He didn’t know what Ely saw in the murky sheen of the walls.

All I see is red.

He let his eyes fade back to white.

A thud and several curses brought him back to the present, and with his knuckles settling against the door, he old-school knocked.

“This better be about the fucking power surge!” Footsteps drew closer. “Fucking cunts can’t even keep a signal.” It was spoken under breath but Gunner heard it loud and clear.

The door opened and he had the man by the throat and back within the room before it latched. It shut behind him, trapping the gurgled yell inside.

“I told you I’m doing much better on my own.”

He walked his target into the adjoining lavatory, enjoying the dead fish dangling from his hand, and dropped him in the upright shower receptacle.

“How? How...” The pirate’s hands rounded his throat, bowing into himself. Gunner took a step back.

“How,” he taunted. “How.”

The man wheezed and grappled to his feet. “How’d you get out?” he said, coughing. “Who?”

Gunner shoved him back into the unit when he tried to step out. “You need to stay in there,” he warned, watching him gulp and sputter, cheeks turning beet red.

“Who the fuck do you think you are? Telling someone like me—”

“Someone like you? A god?” His target grabbed the spout and tore it out by the cord and when he tried to leave, Gunner pushed him back in. “I really need you to stay.” He looked down at the dangling cord and shrugged. “Thought you said we could work together,” he added for measure, stepping back again. He looked around and found a dirty dog tag lying over the sink. Brent. “God’s name is Brent,” Gunner chuckled, “How disappointing.”

Brent digested his words in a way only those pumping with adrenaline could: without much thought.

“I beat you to a rotten piece of pulp! You should be singing your last rites at the gate to hell right now. Who the fuck do you think you are?”

Gunner sighed and pulled his shirt off. The man slammed the showerhead into the side of Gunner’s head, but he was braced for it. He let him get in another hit or two before he wrenched Brent off him and pushed him back into the stall.

“You don’t like listening, do you?”

They shared a look and Gunner could see the crimson of his eyes in the man’s gaze. There’s only so much adrenaline in each of us. Neither broke the contact for what seemed like a dawning eternity.

“What’re you doing?” Brent asked.

Gunner smiled. He tossed his shirt into the room.

“We can work together...” the pirate swallowed, beginning to figure out the predicament he was in.

Gunner unclasped the hook of his pants and let them sag on his hips. “We can work together.”

Brent nodded slightly and straightened his back against the shower wall. He didn’t release his useless weapon but Gunner didn’t expect him to. He wiggled his toes and stretched out his fingers, rolling his head and cracking his neck. This feels good. The man’s fear smells good.

“We can. We can. I can ensure your freedom, hell, a top place in the crew, or money. Tell me what you want and we can work together.”

A few stifling seconds went by before Gunner answered. “I want my ship.”

Brent squeezed his showerhead tighter. “I can’t give you that. I don’t have it.”

Gunner pushed his thumbs into his jeans and let them slide the rest of the way down his legs.

“No. I didn’t think you did. But working requires work, right?” he asked, cocking his head as the pirate stiffened, shaking as he took in his nudity. Gunner stepped out of his pants and kicked them into the bedroom, commanding the lavatory door closed.

“Yes. That’s true. So you want information, and for it... I get to live? We both get to live. I can pretend this never happened and I can transport you out of the brig and into better quarters.” Brent tentatively took a step out of the shower.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” Gunner warned.

He stepped back in.

“What’s going to happen is I’m going to ask you several questions and you’re going to answer them truthfully. If you do that, I’ll let you walk out of here alive.” Gunner didn’t give the guy time to think about it. “What’s your rank?”

“We don’t have ranks on this ship, only jobs, and my job is Lower Warden.”

“You’re in charge of the guards?”

“And the shoe-ins and new recruits. The wares and goods and the runnings of the lower dregs.”

“You have access to the bridge?”

“Only when summoned. I don’t have the codes if you’re looking to take the ship.”

Gunner sat on the closed toilet seat and rested his elbows on his knees. No, he wasn’t going to take the ship. Not yet at least. “Who’s above you?”

“Top deck there’s only the captain of this ship, he goes by Juke. There’s also the co-pilot, the weapons runners, and the nav team but we’re equal in power here. Ballsy is our head of tech and security, if you want the inner workings of the vessel, you’ll want him first. He’s our data anchor.”

“Who’s above them?”

Brent wiped the sweat from his brow. “The fleet. We’re only one in a black market group that work outside the main channels and the off channels. I don’t know how many ships are in employment—that information isn’t open—but we’re one of the higher-ups in the armada, that I do know.”

“Name?”

“None. No one names shit since Larik’s empire went down. Once a name’s been given, it vanishes.”

“And yet names still exist,” Gunner twiddled his thumbs. “What would you call the organization you work for?”

He hesitated, “Black Fleet. All our ships are black and if they’re not, they’re changed.”

“And what does this Black Fleet specialize in?”

“Salvaging. Rebranding what we take and selling it to those looking for what we provide. Boarding lone ships we come across in no man’s space, and those we don’t kill, we traffic and sell to the highest bidder. Like you and yours...”

“Like mine...”

The pirate took a deep breath and Gunner could smell the sour bile released into the air between them.

“Yes,” he agreed.

Gunner sighed and stood, making his captive jerk back. “Where’s my ship?”

“Salvage. Salvage yard. On a salvage station most likely.”

He took a step closer, breathing in the delicious impending moments before a kill. “Where’s that?”

“I don’t know. It’s the truth! I don’t know. I don’t have numbers in my head. Ask me anything about this ship’s underbelly and I can tell you but that, that I don’t know!” Brent pressed his back into the stall wall and his feet slid farther apart.

He’s bracing now... Gunner could hear the flow of blood pumping through Brent’s system. It sounded like wheezing streams squeezed through spaces at a speed that it couldn’t accommodate.

“Calm down. I told you I’d let you walk out of here alive.” Gunner smiled, cruelly. The man didn’t calm.

“Alive has nothing to do with pain.”

“True, but you’re spilling without the pain, aren’t you? So, tell me, out of rabid curiosity where are those in the brig being transported? Where would I be transported if I happened to live through all those torture sessions you had planned for me?”

“The Elyrian auction houses.”

“Hmm...” Gunner looked around at the small space they occupied. It was barely big enough for two people to comfortably fit in and the trappings were all worn down by countless years of use and reuse.

There was rust in the corners and on the walls, markings on the metal, and stains over peeling plastic throughout. It wasn’t big, nor was it clean, but he knew a group of people who would kill to use it just as it was. Showerhead missing and all.

“Are we done?” Brent asked with a quiver in his voice, pulling him back to the conversation at hand.

Gunner turned his back to Brent and flipped on the sink, taking the towel next to him and soaking it. “Not quite,” he muttered, wiping off the days of dried blood and sweat from his face and hands. “I should tell you that no one let me out of the brig and no one helped me get to you.” He flicked his thumb where the new metal was still growing beneath his skin, enjoying the numbing effect his nanocells had. “How, you asked?” He dropped the dirty towel and fluttered his fingers under the spouting water. “I’m just that good.”

“Ballsy will have seen you!” Brent hissed, “There are cameras all over the ship.”

“I know.”

“Then you know that you’re fucked even if you kill me right now, even if you kill the first men that come after you. There’s no place to go on a ship and the escape pods are nowhere near here. And if you make it to them, they’re not fast enough to escape the range of our guns, that much I know.”

“Like I said before, I do well on my own.”

Always have, always will.

Gunner turned and the lavatory door slid open. Brent eyed him wearily, not believing he was going to make it through this alive. He watched as the pirate took a slow step out of the stall and when he didn’t get pushed back in, he stepped fully into the bathroom. Another slow, laborious step, timed and well-placed to skirt around him. The metal cord of the shower head dragged and thunked in his wake.

When Brent was at the door, Gunner stopped him.

“I have one more question, about the dregs, since you’re so knowledgeable about your job.”

The man grabbed the side panel with his free hand and shuddered. “What about it?”

“The prisoner in the cell next to mine...” Gunner whistled out a breath between his lips when Ely’s brown eyes came to mind.

“What about ‘em?”

“Is it a woman?” he asked.

The man stopped and looked back at him, head cocked to the side, brows furrowing. He didn’t immediately answer.

“You don’t know now do you?”

Brent shook his head and stepped into the quarters. “It’s not possible.”

“Isn’t it?”

“He’s a frail, half-dead boy...”

“That’s the truth as I keep hearing it,” Gunner muttered, grabbing Brent by the scruff and pulling him back into the lavatory. He threw him into the shower, taking the cord from his hand.

“Wait, I told you the truth and you gave me your word! Said I would live if I told you what I know!”

“And I kept it. I let you walk out of here,” Gunner waved a hand at the bathroom, “alive.”

The metal in his spine expanded and the skin along his thighs sucked in. His claws elongated, thrusting the bones of his fingers out while his hands tightened into paws. He pressed them into Brent’s windpipe before his next bellow, silencing him forever.

His canines emerged, popping out his teeth as they clattered on the ground at his feet. His nostrils flared with the smell of fresh copper blood—potent and thick enough for him to taste it in the air. Gunner reared his head back as his snout shot out from his skull, pulling and tugging, tucking and twisting his elasticized skin until it stiffened into place. His lower legs haunched and his tail thwacked against his back legs. Metal on metal.

It felt so good.

Brent squirmed, choking under his grip, bloodshot eyes wide with terror. But the squirming, the fishy movements of an agonized struggle was what really got him.

Really made him crave fish.

A low rumble formed in the back of his throat. A growl filled the tiny space. Gunner pulled back his lips and the guns on his cheeks cut in half as his mandible dropped to reveal the sharp teeth behind them. He puffed one hot breath over Brent’s face before he tore it off.

The body he held took time to die. It seized and flapped and fought him until the very end, and once it finally stopped, he’d already shifted back into the man he pretended to be. One who watched blood pool at his feet with blood-red eyes.

Gunner released the corpse and reached for the shower cord, feeding it back into the wall and screwing the top head back in. When he was done, water spewed over him and gurgling spurts. The time still ticked in his head.

He washed the blood from his body, from beneath his nails, and his hair, then lifted his foot and washed that off too before stepping out and away from the husk crumbled at the bottom. He searched around the floor and found all of his teeth, disposing of them in a nearby trash receptacle.

When Gunner was done, he used his visuals to scan for any lingering evidence of his person, finding nothing but wayward nanocells already crumbling in on themselves and dying.

He left the water running and the corpse beneath it, closing the door behind him to pick up his clothes, dressing in record time.

He stilled. His fingers straightened and clenched at his sides as a slow smile lifted his lips. Gunner moved to the nightstand next to the bed and opened the side door. In it lay one of his guns. He could always sense when one was nearby.

His gun. An AMT AutoMag Starnaught III. Not one of his favorites but one of his personal stock all the same. Oh, sweet baby, gunner girl. He traced his fingers along its side before he grasped it and checked its chamber. His bullets remained within, unfired and perfect. He lifted the weapon to his nose and breathed. Disgusted and excited by the smells that flooded his nose.

It smelled like the man he’d just killed.

Gunner returned to the bathroom and cleaned the metal, ignoring the body in the shower and rubbed his own smell back all over it. He found a leather gun strap and banded it around his inner thigh, covered by his pants, and secured his firearm in place.

An extension of himself. His first taste of conquest with the job at hand.

He made his way back through the crew deck, eager to get to his cell. An airy chuckle escaped his lips. His cock was stiff from the action.

The security feeds surged and fizzled once to account for the time lost.

The elevator doors opened and the sour smells of the brig returned to him full force and with it, Ely’s weak sweet smell hidden like a needle in a haystack within. Gunner reached for his boots when a familiar laughter stopped him.

A familiar smell accompanied it. He straightened and followed the noise and ended up at the same room he passed earlier.

“Juke’s got a spot to fill.”

“Of course he does. Fucker can’t keep a ship this big running with what he’s got,” the man snickered.

That laugh. Gunner dropped his boots letting the noise echo heavy and hard down the hallway.

“What was that?”

“Hell if I know?”

“Shit must’ve fallen over,” one of them sighed audibly. “I’ll go check it out.”

“You do you,” the man with the laugh grunted.

Gunner waited, listening to the footfalls steadily coming closer to his location. His hand stretched out, fingers spread, as he loosened his joints. The lights dimmed above him and he closed his eyes. The woosh of air being expelled sounded, the last noise of a man who hadn’t kept his guard up while stepping into the hallway.

The lights went out. Gunner opened his eyes, grabbed the man by the back of his head, and pulled him against his chest. He felt the guard’s racing pulse before he snapped the man’s neck.

“What the—?” A series of noises—a steel chair skidding, an intake of breath, items hitting the ground—filled Gunner’s ears from the room beyond. “What’d you do to the fucking lights!?”

The corpse sagged and Gunner lowered it softly to the floor.

“Lenny, you there? This better not be some trick!”

He stepped over the body and began to laugh.

“Shit, man, what’s wrong with you? Turn the lights back on. Ballsy’s going to kill us for this!”

No, I’m going to kill you for this. Gunner continued laughing, cackling as he moved closer to his prey. The bones in his face vibrating, hoping for another shift again. The darkness couldn’t stop him. He knew where his victim was without night vision, without lights.

“Stop laughing, Lenny...”

It only made Gunner screech and chuckle louder, moving in a steady circle around the guard, disregarding the chairs and toppled supplies in his way. This is fun. His laughter became genuine. Freshly expelled sweat thick in the air, and the stench of fear replaced everything else in his head.

“I’m going to kill you for—”

Gunner roared with laughter. He closed the distance and grabbed the man before he could slither farther away and bellowed the noise into his terrified face.

It drowned out the struggle as Gunner pulled the man upright and let his own eyes bleed red with light. An angry moment of recognition.

The guard punched him in the gut before reaching for the gun hanging off his side. Gunner expelled air and covered the guard’s hand with his own. The man’s finger pressed over the trigger, and Gunner pushed his own over it, crushing it and wrenching the man’s wrist to face away.

They twisted to the ground, filling the room with bellowing threats and grunts, and, of course, laughter. Gunner straddled him on the floor, gaining leverage. He kept the gun pointed away, pressing into the man’s broken finger bones to subdue him, with only the red of his eyes to illuminate the scene.

With his other hand, he slammed the guard’s head into the floor and fought the gun upward. His prey kicked out his legs and rammed his fist into Gunner’s nose.

“You don’t give up, do you?” he chuckled through the momentary sting.

But time was ticking and he’d already spent far too long outside his cell.

The ship’s sirens blared off as if fate itself watched the events unfolding and knew his thoughts.

“I’m going to kill you! I’m going to fucking kill you!” the guard screeched.

Gunner tsked, “I told you that you to watch your skin.” And with one final sickening giggle, he crushed the bones in his grip and pushed the barrel of the gun into the pirate’s mouth, silencing what he no longer wanted to hear. The gunshot was muffled but echoed enough to alert any others who may be nearby.

Before Gunner could watch the guard’s last twitch of life, he was up and leaving the room, picking up his boots in the hallway.

But stopped when he noticed the extra rations lying about. Gunner scooped them up and pocketed them.

He blinked the red glow away from his eyes and whistled his way back to the brig, hearing the sounds of running feet somewhere far off in the ship’s hallways. The darkness stayed with him until he passed through the brig’s doors. The lights remained off, shrouding the units in its perpetual pitch.

The blaring sirens hid the sounds of his passage as he slipped into Royce’s unit and killed him swiftly and silently. He pulled his jacket off the body and hung it over his shoulder.

Four dead tonight.

Gunner dragged Royce’s body to the cell door, clawed the man’s wrist and hooked his arm around the bars, letting his blood drain over the lock. He pushed the cell door closed, checked Ely’s lock, and re-entered his own cage.

With one final laugh escaping him, he rested his back against the chilly wall, right next to where Ely crouched on the other side, and leaned his head back.

Fuck patience. His palm ran over the firearm hidden under his pants. He seeded back outside his body and triple-checked the security feeds, sending another surge through the system, and adding more confusion to the already growing chaos. He wasn’t on any of them, and regardless of any crumbs he may have left behind, he couldn’t really bring himself to care.

He rested his arms on his knees and flicked his half-grown thumb with his middle finger, letting the satisfaction flow over him, and the feel of his gun on his thigh was like a lover’s caress. Exhaustion settled in and his body pulled him down into the throes of sleep, reminding him that energy was neither created nor destroyed but it sure as hell had left his systems.

Seventy-nine occupants left.