Free Slave World by Johnny Stone Page A

human mountain and I staggered under the relentlessly pounding. My vision blurred with stars, and the coppery taste of blood filled my mouth while I slumped against the bulkhead. His iron grip dragged me from the cockpit, effortlessly tossing me into the corridor in a heap where several of his companions waited. Faces spun about me and my first impression was that the dregs of society were loose on my ship. Somehow the cargo had gotten free, revived from stasis and released. Damn… I’d forgotten it was a built in safety feature of the cryo-tube in the event of power failure. John! O’my god, what happened to John?
    “Hurry up, get control of the ship,” Deep Voice yelled in the background again.
    I cried out, trying to shield myself from the heavy boot that stomped at my midsection. My instinct for self-preservation finally took over and I caught it, twisting it sharply at an unnatural angle. My effort was rewarded by a loud crack, followed by screaming as the man above me crashed to the deck. A hard jerk on my hair preceded a solid kick to my side, and I crumpled like a house of cards before being pulled back to my feet.
    I’d never been very good at hand to hand combat. I was a damn good pilot and could fly a fighter up a gnat’s ass backward, but a martial artist I wasn’t. Regardless, I lashed out blindly, fueled by desperate fear and primal instinct. I connected with the knife-edge of my hand on one of their throats, crushing his windpipe. He fell to the deck fighting desperately, but in vain, to breathe. Another received a quick but deadly punch to his solar plexus. The air left me with a solid uppercut below my floater rib, doubling me over in agony. I gritted my teeth in reckless anger, clutching my side, doing the first thing that came to mind; I kicked him between the legs.
    His face locked in an expression of deathly shock; he didn’t even have time to scream before dying. Servo assisted implants had amplified my strength to the point of delivering a deadly kick to his sensitive and vulnerable groin, shattering his pelvis like glass. It splintered, rupturing both his femoral arteries in an explosion of crimson. If it weren’t for the bone laminate reinforcing and the tinsel strength enhancement of my muscles and ligaments, I’d tear my body apart doing things like that.
    I heard more than felt the solid thunk, as my head rocked forward, paralyzing me. It came again.
    “Crazy, fucking bitch!”
    My vision dimmed and the back of my head exploded with pain. I wobbled briefly before collapsing, blacking out.
     
    ***
     
    I floated in and out of consciousness, surrounded in the darkness of eternity. I hurt everywhere and welcomed the painless bliss of sleep whenever it found me. Apparition-like voices teased my dreams; who were they? What’s happening? One sounded oddly like my Father. Daddy, is that you? No, it couldn’t be, he’s dead.
    “She’s valuable, see that tattoo and bar code on her arm? All Fleet personnel that received the Wolverine II upgrade during the Seth’Kelain War were marked for later identification in the event they survived. I bet she still has a half million worth of implanted gear, even after they took out the combat related hardware.”
    “No shit? Maybe we should chop her up for parts.”
    “We could, but it would be nothing but junk for the most part; everything is tuned to her neural network. Trust me, she’s worth more in one piece; there aren’t many of her kind around any longer. The enhancement program was stopped after only one year and the casualty rate for the recipients was upward of 80%, from what I remember.”
    “Bullshit, anyone can get jacked up like her. Strength, speed-”
    “No, it’s more than that; we’re talking a total enhancement package like you wouldn’t believe. Look, here’s her service number, it can be verified.”
    “I guess you would know, wouldn’t you?”
    Darkness…
     
    “I know I can rig something up, we removed the defense