Blood Impulse

Part 40.1 - EAGLE EYES

Cardioid Sector, HR-14 System, Crimson Heart's Base of Operations

The definition of falling changed somewhat in zero-G. Orbits were one matter, where the constant free-fall around the curvature of a planet generated an imitation of weightlessness, but true zero-G was something different. Falling in such a case could simply be construed as moving feet-first. Usually, it was purposeful and controlled, given that one had to push themselves off in that orientation.

Zarrey quite liked falling without gravity. It made it easy for his boots to grab onto surfaces, and he never had to lower his rifle, except to push off. But usually, landing was the more dangerous part, so once he leapt from the Singularity's airlock and sailed into the base's, he caught the frame with one hand and reoriented himself to glide feet-first.

The airlock opened into a 'T' junction with one corridor directly ahead, leading deeper into the base, and two more following the outer edge of the base in opposite directions. After a moment of falling toward the center corridor, it was clear the path into the base was empty. Stretching deeply beyond his feet, Zarrey couldn't see its end. With infrared emission so slight from the ambient temperature of the walls, the goggles he wore could only resolve their detail to a certain distance. Beyond that, the walls dissolved into a green haze with only darkness beyond.

Objects that emitted infrared passively such as the waste heat of wiring conduits or the body of a human glowed in various colors. The corridors, retaining ambient heat from the air, showed in a greenish tint. The color was lighter now than it had been passing between the Singularity's hulls, these walls warmer than the ship's freshly pressurized structure.

In the junction ahead of him, Blosse and Yankovich glowed oddly in the goggles' color-toned display. Their pants and shirts were a yellow, tight enough to the skin for some warmth to bleed through, but the body armor and helmets they wore were a distinct blue, insulated and cold to the touch, as were their rifles. Their faces were orange, cut off by the goggles they wore, which covered their eyes in complex layers of hard-edged green and blue shapes. It was disconcerting to see something so mechanical where he expected to find eyes and eyebrows.

Blosse's hair was particularly fascinating through the infrared lens. Normally it was a reddish-brown, long and wavy. Woven into one long braid, it wriggled behind her like a snake. Where it poked out from her helmet, it was orange, but ran in a gradient through yellow and into green at is end, matching the ambient temperature.

Determining they had seen enough of the corridor ahead of them, Yankovich and Blosse grabbed the mag-anchors off their belts. Yankovich tossed his to the right, and Blosse to the left. The anchors stuck to the walls with a minor thud that made Zarrey wince as everything else was so perfectly quiet. But there was no response to the noise as the Marines used the anchors to tug themselves in a new direction.

Landing softly, Blosse and Yankovich used their rifles to peer into their respective corridors. They found nothing down there sights, merely more of the same emptiness.

Zarrey had expected as much, tossed his own anchor down and pulled himself to the edge of the path that led deeper into the base. He scoped it out once more, but nothing stirred in the depths. After power had been knocked out, the pirates had no way to know when or where the Singularity might dock, even if it was an easy guess she would. By result, their forces were probably guarding objectives, not airlocks.

"Quiet as nighttime on the damn moon," Zarrey murmured. It was a good start. The rest of his task force wouldn't be in danger coming through the airlock. "Beta team," he radioed, "come on over. It's time to party."