Kaeru walked into the admin room and sat down in his chair.
'I've dropped all the needed documentation on your workspace, I think you'll be busy with that for the first few days. There are no real issues at the moment so you don't have to dive into the shit right away.' Satosana said with a smile.
Kaeru took his time getting to know the systems in the next days, occasionally dropping by people who has some small problem using their personal systems.

There were only a few days to go until launch when they were having lunch in the diner. All of them were feeling a bit nervous despite knowing for so long that they'll leave Earth really behind.
'How about we go for a splurge in my room afterwards?' Satosana suggested.
'I don't know...' Zeikre said. 'Is that safe? I mean, I know your tricks, but I don't know what Kaeru has on his mind.'
He looked up. 'Me?'
'Yes, you. I don't know if I can trust you when you're drunk. Especially with Celentia.'
She choked on her drink. 'Zeikre!'
'What?' she asked, looking innocent. 'Before you know it you'll both wake up in the same bed and don't remember all the fun before.'


The docking master walked up to the cargo ship's captain. He didn't like the looks of the crew unloading the crates from the ship. Somehow they didn't fit with the regular crowd working docking bays.
'Welcome. I hope you had a good flight.'
'Thanks, it was uneventful.' the captain replied. 'This cargo was sent last minute, it's for the science lab so it shouldn't be opened until we hand it over personally.'
The master nodded, not unfamiliar with this situation but a bit surprised that it happened here. 'You can find the lab if you use that corridor.' he said, pointing it out.
The captain nodded, then grabbed a suitcase. 'We also have something for the captain, is he on the bridge?'
The master nodded. 'He should be.'
'Then we'll be on our way.'
The master watched him leave together with three of his men, wondering what's so special with the seven suitcases they were carrying.


Celentia left protesting for the kitchen, leaving Zeikre and Satosana behind snickering.
'Hey Kaeru, why don't you go help her?' Zeikre suggested. 'She can use a friend right now that doesn't make fun of her.'
'Yeah yeah...' he said as he got up. 'If you want some time together just say so.'
He left the snickering couple behind and walked into the kitchen. 'I'm sorry you have such friends, embarrassing you in front of others.'
She smiled. 'It's okay, I've known them for a while now. Besides, I sure hope you have better taste in girls than some chubby black Kat working the kitchen.' she said and continued putting the dishes into the washer.
'Ehh.' Kaeru cleared his throat. 'Actually.., I eh, think you're quite cute...' he said, then quickly got some plates to scrape off the remains into the bin.
She blushed, closed the washer and turned it on, standing there speechless.
He turned around with the stash of dishes, then carefully placed them on the counter next to her, glancing her way. She was snickering now.
'Don't be silly.' she said
He grabbed her arm and pulled her with her back against him. 'I'm serious. I think you're really cute, but at the same time I can't face you, feeling I'm making an idiot of myself.'


'Captain.' the watchman on the bridge said. 'The captain of the transport ship is here to see you.'
The captain looked up from his schedule and looked at the man in the doorway. 'Yes, what can I do for you?'
'Excuse the interruption captain.' he said. 'But I'm here for urgent business.'
'Yes?'
'The ship is ready for departure?'
'Yes, just about. What business is so urgent?'
The men who came behind the captain of the transport ship each dropped one suitcase, pressed the top of the other and it split in two, revealing the machinegun built inside.
'The business of taking over your ship.' the man said, smiling deviously.


Celentia grabbed his arms, unsure of what to do.
Kaeru felt his heart beating fast, thinking of what to do if she pushed him away.
She felt his heartbeat through her back, matching the throb of her own. She wanted to be loved by him, yet she was still afraid he might be disappointed in her.
The alarm, triggered by one of the crew on the bridge just before he got shot, startled the both of them.
They ran out of the kitchen. 'What's going on?' Kaeru asked Satosana.
'No idea! Let's go!' He answered, running off to the admin room.

There were no indications of something going wrong with the systems or network. The message on one of the consoles only indicated a general alarm and Satosana killed off the local buzzer.
'It's not a hull breach or fire or anything like that. Something like that would cause damage to at least some part of the network.' Satosana remarked as he went backwards through logs to see what might've caused the alarm.
Kaeru watched over his shoulder as there was nothing more he could do at the moment.
'In any case let's make sure everything's secure in the server room. Can you check on airco, power and extinguisher?'
Kaeru walked up to the server room. The display next to the glass door indicated everything's fine with a full green statusbar, so he punched in the code and the door opened.
Inside the temperature was a cool 16 degrees, the only noise the soft hum of the servers and storage systems. He walked between the seperate black racks to the end of the room where the panel with oldfashioned gauges was placed. These indicated the cooling liquid for the airco was at full level, as were the levels for the extinguisher gas and the backup power batteries.
The low light level and all the green, blue, orange and red lights made him feel like he was the protagonist of a first person shooter set on a space colony. A place suddenly invaded by monsters from hell or something.
He walked back to the door, then saw someone come into the admin room armed with a short submachine gun. Instinctively he moved behind one of the racks, looking carefully around the corner to see what's going on.
'What's the meaning of this!?' Satosana asked.
'Shut up.' said the first of two men who had entered the room. 'Out of the chair and up against the wall.'
Satosana obeyed, seeing that he was serious and didn't look like he would tolerate protests.
Kaeru saw the second man walk toward the server room and ducked away.
"Crap!" he thought. "Move!"
He moved quickly and silently to the side door leading to the storage racks, slipping through it before the main door opened. In the storage room he looked around for a hiding place.
"The last rack! It's empty!" he thought as he remembered that one.
Again quickly and silently he opened the back of the rack, then crawled beneath the lowest shelf, barely able to fit himself inside.
It seemed an eternity before he heard the door open and footsteps coming his way. They came to the end of the room and Kaeru could see the silhouette through the perforated door. He saw the man turn around, then heard him leave the room but he didn't want to fall into a trap so he stayed put.

He wasn't sure how long it had been as he didn't dare to check the mobile, afraid the light from the display might betray him, but he took his chance and carefully opened the back door from the rack. He couldn't see any sign of movement, crawled out of the rack and moved carefully towards the door.
He couldn't see any sign of the men through the windows in the door, opened it silently and checked the server room. Again no sign of anyone and he moved to the server room door, keeping an eye out for movement outside. The admin room was empty.
He sat down in his chair, knowing he can't stay there because they might come back without warning.
"Crapcrapcrappit!" he thought to himself. "Think!"
He logged into his console hoping it might give him some ideas.
"Two armed men came in here. They didn't look like security forces so it must've been some criminal group. They took Sato away, but it seems they didn't know I was here so I have a chance to do something. First things first, I need a hideout, then I'll have to find out what's going on."
He punched up information on the ship, then looked at the construction of the admin, server and storage room.
"Okay, we've got cable ducts, air ducts and maintenance ducts all over the ship. That's one way to move around."
He logged off from his console, not wanting to leave obvious evidence of another admin, opened the supply cabinet and grabbed a portable, starting it up and checking its status.
"Good, it works and I can reach the systems." he thought.
He grabbed a backpack for the portable, cables, powersupply, paper and pens, flaslight and earphones. He stuffed everything inside and hung the backpack in front. That way it wouldn't get caught onto something when he forgot he was wearing it.
He looked back at the admin room as he opened the server room door to make sure he didn't forget anything, then went to the back, unlocked the panel leading to the cable duct, crawled inside and closed it behind him. The air in here smelled of electronics and he crawled to the first junction where he took out the portable and checked the plans for the ducts.
"First, check on the girls." he thought trying to ignore his shaking legs.
He found the route for the kitchen, memorized it and stuffed the portable back into the backpack.
Not used to moving like this he soon felt his knees and made a note for himself to find the toolshed for engineering. They'd have knee protectors for sure.
It took him a while, crawling through the ducts lined with cables, splitter boxes, switches and routers. He reached an air duct leading to the grate in the back wall of the kitchen. He couldn't see anyone inside it but he did hear voices from the dining room.
As if the engineers had foreseen the situation, there was a panel in the duct which could be opened from the inside, and that's how Kaeru ended up on the sink. He took a quick look outside, a large group was sitting at the tables guarded by 3 armed men. He recognised two of them as the ones who took Satosana. These were Kats, dark fur, wearing black clothing, the third was man, wearing green-brown camouflage clothing. All three were armed with the same short submachine guns which Kaeru recognized as being used by specialist groups from military and police. "And then they say games don't teach you anything." he thought.
He noticed the girls and Satosana sitting close to the counter and looked around for something to get their attention. Hoping Celentia's ears were good he took a fine wineglass and small spoon, then tapped the glass softly. The ringing was obvious enough to him, now he needed to make it clear enough for her.
He lay down on the floor where he could just see her face, then tapped the glass twice. He didn't see a reaction from her so he tried again. Still nothing. This time he tried a little harder and he saw a reaction from her left ear. She had twitched it back once. Not wanting to alert the armed Kats he waited, then tapped the glass twice again. Her ear twitched again and she rubbed it, then turned her head, scrathing the back of it while glancing into the kitchen. Her eyes grew wide for a moment, then she looked in front of her quickly.
Now he had to find a place to hide and wait until she could make a move. There was enough room underneath the sink to hide so he waited there.
Celentia coughed a bit, then held up her arm. 'Is it okay if I pass around water to drink?'
The man looked at his comrades who nodded. 'Yeah, okay.'
Zeikre and Satosana were a bit surprised at her question. She walked into the kitchen looking around only with her eyes. When she saw Kaeru behind the door under the sink she winked, then took an armful of water bottles and went back, passing them around to the people.
When she stood next to one of the Kats she heard a rumble from his stomach.
'Ah, can I make sandwiches too? Some here haven't eaten in a while.'
The Kat nodded in approval and she went back into the kitchen.
'What are you doing here?' she whispered as she took what she needed for the sandwiches, making extra noise.
'I managed to hide when they came into the admin room. When they left I came out, then thought of moving around in the ducts. What's going on?'
'I don't know exactly.' she whispered as she made the sandwiches. 'From what I've heard it's some terrorist group who've taken over control of the ship. I don't know if they want a ransom or whatever.'
'Do you know how many?'
'No.' she stepped in front of the sink, holding down one of the sandwiches. 'Hungry?'
He took it and stroke her leg softly. 'Thanks.'
She felt a little blush coming up and went back to making more.
'Wait here.' she said as she took a large plate out.
The sandwiches were welcomed and even the three hijackers grabbed a few. She went back into the kitchen when the plate was empty.
'What are you going to do?' she asked.
'I don't know. I think I'll try to assess the situation first, see what's going on. And if I can find a way to give us the upper hand I'll try that.'
She handed him a package with food and water and he took her hand. 'Thanks, if I can get us out of this I will.'
'Be careful.' she said, squeezing his hand a little.
'I will.'
As soon as she went out with the second plate he crawled back into the duct, went back to the junction and looked through the plans for a place to hide.

He looked around. "Tubes, cables, electronics, steel. Everything a home needs." he thought "Not to mention loads of dust.".
The space he found on the plans was relatively close to the kitchen, 10 minutes crawling and two floors up. Some small tools and parts were still here from the time of construction. Beside the knee protection he'd have to go by the laundromats to grab something to sleep on. If he could sleep.
He plugged in the portable and logged into one of the standard application servers. From there he could check if someone was logged into the security servers. No-one was, so he could log on and check the media feeds. He watched the bridge first and turned on the audio at the sight of the armed men there.
"Reminder to self, account info is available on security servers, fix that before someone finds out." he thought.
'..on it's way. It should be here in a few hours.' one of the men said into the intercom.
'Okay, keep me informed.' the reply went.

Nothing much happened after that so he switched to the other media feeds. After going through the lot he concluded they rounded up everyone in several larger spaces around the ship and a few men patrolled the main coridors. He didn't see anyone standing out as the leader though. He sighed and leaned back. "Crap! What am I going to do?" he thought. He noticed how fast his heart was beating and his hands didn't feel as steady as they should. Taking a few deep breaths didn't help much, but it was a start. "Think survival first, then taking out the bad guys second." he thought as he grabbed the plans and inventory of the ship. "I can hide here, and there are several other places like this around the ship. Now what do we have for weapons, preferably something stealthy." Beside tazer weapons nothing else was in stock as it would cause more damage than good when used in space. "Nice, and what if one of the cows goes haywire and runs around the ship?" He paused for a moment to think back about what he just said. "If only..." he thought and grabbed the supply lists.
'Yes!' he said to himself as he went through the vetinarian's list. "Dartguns and darts to bring livestock to sleep from afar if necessary."