Jack couldn’t help himself. He peered out the window of the Elutheria’s airlock at the ship looming in front of them. From the small view he was afforded by the window and the close proximity of their vessels, he could tell something was wrong. There were no lights, no evidence of propulsion, no sign of life across the entire vessel. In true pirate fashion, Captain Rivera had opted to investigate, thinking there could potentially be valuable loot left behind. Jack couldn’t help but hope the captain was right. They had been in space for too long without a prize. Food was almost gone, they were low on munitions and their ship was on their last power cells.

“What you think?” his friend, Kev, asked from beside him.

“Could be adrift with no power?” Jack suggested, furrowing his brow.

Behind the two men, Alex racked the slide of his plasma rifle. “Impossible.” He shouldered the rifle as Jack and Kev glanced in his direction. “If it had lost power, it would be drifting on inertia. This ship is stuck dead in space. Someone turned it off intentionally.”

The fourth member of their away team, Maddi, scoffed but said nothing. Jack exchanged the tiniest of smiles with Kev. Much as Alex had a tendency to spout wild conspiracy theories on the daily, this time he actually had a point. It was better not to tell Maddi that though. She had a few very good reasons to hate Alex and did not take kindly to people siding with him. Wisely, both Jack and Kev chose to say nothing.

“Enough chatter,” a new voice spoke. Captain Rivera stepped into the airlock, his long jacket flowing behind him like a cloak. His ice-blue eyes fixed on Alex, then on Maddi. “Focus.”

The deck pitched and bucked beneath their feet as the Elutheria came to a halt and her boarding tube extended. Jack stretched out a hand for the door panel, hesitated for the briefest of moments. At Captain Rivera’s nod, he opened the airlock.

“Push forward.”

At the captain’s order, Jack and Kev stepped into the boarding tube and towards the other ship’s airlock door. As expected, the door panel did not respond. Kev pulled out a small explosive and fixed it to the center of the airlock’s door. “Back!”

Jack obeyed at once, backing up down the boarding tube. He swallowed his nervousness as the explosive’s timer ticked away. He knew Kev’s explosives were suited to only pop the door open, rather than inflicting mass carnage and blowing the boarding tube up with all of them sucked into the vaccuum of space. If something went wrong.

He flinched at the loud pop, followed quickly by a loud clanging sound. The pieces of the door fell apart. Jack and Kev leveled their rifles and picked their way over the wreckage. No one jumped out of hidden wall panels or side corridors and opened fire. They both switched their scope lights on, bathing the airlock and the corridor beyond in bright, white light.

“Alex. Kev. Engine room. Jack. Maddi. With me, we’ll take the bridge.” Captain Rivera drew his pistol and pushed past the two of them. Maddi followed without hesitation. Jack brought up the rear, pointing his rifle down every adjacent pathway they walked past. Still nothing. Still no one. The ship smelled almost sterile. No faint scent of body odor, or food, or the distinct smell of the plasma that powered interstellar vessels. It was almost as if no one had ever been aboard. Not even the ghosts of memories could be found.

The bridge was no exception. No lights. No beeps from panels or chimes from alerts. The captain’s chair in the center of the bridge was as empty as the rest of the ship. There weren’t even bodies. Jack looked around, tapping buttons and consoles to no avail. Had there been a fight?

“Captain?” Maddi asked, her voice more tense and nervous than Jack had ever heard it.

Rivera rubbed his chin thoughtfully. Jack had always admired his ability to keep his emotions under the surface. Instead of answering Maddi, he pulled his communicator off his belt. “Kev. Status?”

Kev’s staticy voice answered at once. Every few words seemed to blur. The trio on the bridge had to focus hard to make out what he was saying. “Engine room is deserted like the rest of the ship.”

“Can you restore power?” Rivera asked. “If we can access the computer, we might be able to figure out what happened here.”

A moment’s silence, then Kev replied. “Maybe. From what I can tell, fuel tanks have been drained and the power cells have been removed. I might be able to tap into the emergency power.”

Maddi shifted uncomfortably and Jack had the sinking feeling she was suddenly regretting her abrupt dismissal of Alex’s theory. Someone had to have removed the power cells intentionally.

“Restore emergency power as best you can, then meet us at the bridge,” Rivera ordered and cut the transmission.

A tense silence settled on the bridge, punctuated by the occasional clap of a boot on the deck or a drawn in breath. Finally, something clicked to life. Lights came on and consoles lit up.

“Finally!” Jack exclaimed as he cut the scopelight on his rifle.

Rivera stood in the center of the bridge, seeming lost in thought. If he heard Jack, he gave no visible sign of it. Maddi fiddled with a control panel next to him. He turned his head, watching her as she attempted to gain entry to the ship’s main computer. Without access codes, Jack felt it was likely a futile endeavour but said nothing to her. Let her try, he thought. At best, they might gain knowledge and at worst, having something to do would keep her nerves in check. Jack clutched his rifle, reassuring himself that everything would be fine, an effort to keep his own nerves in check.

“A ship, alone in space. No crew. No power. Why?” Jack murmured, half to himself, half to Rivera.

As if the universe itself wanted to give him the answer his captain could not, the ship violently bucked beneath him. A wall across from him ruptured, lighting the bridge with sparks. He threw out an arm and managed to grab a bulkhead just in time to prevent himself from being thrown to the deck.

Rivera was already in motion, leaping into the captain’s chair and yelling into his communicator. “Elutheria! Report!”

“Naval vessel dropped out of light-speed right on top of us!” their Quartermaster, Nico, replied at once, his voice filled with panic. “They outgun us and we're taking damage!!”

“Hold position and return fire!” Rivera barked. Without waiting for a response, he cut the communication. “Let’s go!” He sprinted for the door, Maddi right on his heels. Rivera barreled past Kev and Alex just as they stepped onto the bridge. Kev stared blankly past him, then turned to Jack.

Jack pushed him back the way he’d come. “No questions! Just run!” They ran, heedless of each other, their only desire to get back to the airlock. They slammed into walls as the ship pitched and bucked. They passed corridors filled with debris and flame, the result of the Terran Interstellar Navy’s less than precise assault. Not that the navy needed to care. This had been a trap. Their crew had walked right into it. The Navy didn’t need this ship anymore.

They rounded a corner and saw the airlock in sight. Jack felt elation and triumph coursing through his veins, spurring him on. That elation turned to horror as a grinding screech suddenly reverberated through the ship and the Elutheria pulled away. Jack didn’t have time to scream. Nor did any of them have time to run. The sudden yank forward as all the oxygen in the corridor rushed towards the airlock pulled all three of them off their feet and hurtling towards space itself. Even if Jack had had time to scream, he couldn’t. The air had been pulled from his lungs to. There was no up. No down. He was simply in total freefall, launched towards a fate he had no control over.

As suddenly as the corridor had become a death trap, quiet and calm returned. Jack crashed into the deck, rolling into the emergency forcefield that had activated at the last possible second. As relieved as he was to not find himself floating aimlessly across a frozen void, his relief was mildly dampened by four bodies crashing on top of him in a disjointed tangle of limbs, grunts, groans and pained grimaces.

After extracting Alex’s elbow from his left knee and Maddi’s boot from his solar plexus, Jack clambered to his feet. Rivera had gotten up before him and was yelling into his communicator. “NICO! EXPLAIN YOURSELF!” Rivera’s voice was as close to sheer panic as Jack had ever heard it.

Nico’s voice was short and cold. “Apologies, Captain. Given our present circumstances, I feel a change of command is warranted.” Jack could almost hear the smirk in Nico’s voice. It made his blood boil. “You led us into this trap. You were so convinced this would be the easiest prize of our career, you failed to see the obvious. The men here all agreed...had I been captain from the beginning, we would not be in this situation. I wish you luck. You will need it.” Rivera hurled his communicator with a snarl.

With clenched fists, Jack glared out the open airlock. A sleek, powerful looking warship was in view, impossibly close and getting closer. Curiously, the ship wasn’t firing on anything anymore. The Elutheria was out of Jack’s view, but if battle was still joined, surely he would see the results of the Elutheria’s guns. Energy scatter against shields, or perhaps hull breaches if their comrades were lucky enough.

The sides of the warship were pristine and appeared untouched. Jack scowled. Former comrades, he reminded himself. Their former comrades must be away at lightspeed by now. The warship was now coming for them. Likely with a full battalion of soldiers aboard. There was no way the five of them could fight off such numbers.

“What do we do, Captain?” Maddi asked softly.

Rivera shook his head. His shoulders were drooped. His expression was sullen. “I’m not the captain.” He turned his back on the airlock. "There is no captain."