Kitty was spooked. His tell was a tremor in his facial protuberances. I scanned for patrols again, even though there are never patrols in the Dark Sector. Nothing.
“Relax,” I said.
We’d followed a faint signal deep in the Sector, and now its source came into view. A derelict shuttle adrift in space, its single life sign flickering in and out like a candle. No weapons.
A rescue mission, or maybe a salvage. Either way, potentially profitable.
I maneuvered our spaceship to the shuttle’s airlock and docked.
“Investigate, Kitty.”
Kitty moaned.
I couldn’t force a temperamental, 300-pound, tech-enhanced squid-cat-bear to obey me. I resorted to persuasion.
“Come on, Kitty,” I pleaded. “You’d still be working for those mercenaries if I hadn’t sprung you. I wiped their control programs and set you free. Remember?”
He didn’t, of course. I’d wiped most of Kitty’s memories. Even memories of his offspring, taken from him (or her?) by Yutani Laboratories.
Kitty’s whiskers quivered again. Did he sense danger in the shuttle?
“I’ll give you a treat,” I promised.
Kitty unbuckled reluctantly and went outside, squeezing his fat body through the airlock. I closed the hatch and watched through the window.
Kitty appeared to be shrieking and waving his tentacles.
I hit the coms button. “What’s going on?”
No answer. I put on a suit and went through the airlock.
Kitty punched me, yanked off my helmet, and hurled me into a wall. Luckily the shuttle had a breathable atmosphere. He raised a tentacle to hit me again.
“Kitty!” I shouted. “Deactivate!”
Kitty hesitated, then punched me again. I fell. One more punch and it would be lights out.
“Kitty, deactivate,” I pleaded. “I’ll fix this. I’ll reactivate you. I swear on my children.”
Kitty considered. His eyes closed and he collapsed to the shuttle floor.
I dragged Kitty to the airlock. He weighed a ton. Soon we were in the medical bay, Kitty sprawled on a metal table, me holding a scalpel and electrodes. Kitty’s scalp was scarred from all the previous surgeries. I found a spot to make my cut and peeled away enough skin to insert the electrode.
The scanner showed multiple malware infections. Wipers, trojans, worms. Patiently I removed them, one by one. Goddam shuttle was booby-trapped.
I left Kitty on the table, put on a helmet, and returned to the shuttle.
“Anybody home?”
No answer.
I dialed my firewall to 10 and activated the display. The shuttle was infested with malware. Black eels circled me, trying to attach. The firewall kept them out.
“Over here,” a small voice squeaked.
A little girl huddled against a bulkhead, her knees tucked under her chin.
I swept her for malware. She was clean.
“Where are your parents?” I asked.
“Dead.”
“Did you send a distress signal?”
She shrugged. “I pushed buttons.”
I knelt beside her. “I’m going to get you out of here.”
Steel bars slid down from the ceiling, trapping me inside the shuttle. Only then did I notice the skulls and bones scattered on the floor. I reached for the girl, but my hand passed through her.
Shit. A honeypot.
“Were you ever a real girl?”
She glanced at a small skull in the corner.
“Dead,” she said, as she flickered and vanished.
“Kitty, activate!” I yelled into my coms. I heard only static. “Activate!”
Kitty crawled into the shuttle. He looked groggy.
“It’s a honeypot,” I said. “Get me out of here.”
Kitty looked at the steel bars. He touched one, then pulled on it tentatively.
“Try harder,” I suggested.
I glanced at my display. Malwares were attaching to Kitty like remoras.
“Turn on your firewall.”
Too late. Kitty was breathing hard, pupils dilated in all three eyes.
“Kitty!”
One of the bars bent and snapped. I squeezed through the narrow gap.
“Let’s get out of here.”
Kitty was staring at the bulkhead behind me. Yellow mucus filled his third eye.
“Are you … crying?”
I turned to look. Hunkered among the scattered bones, a larval creature glistened and pulsed.
Kitty began frantically pulling at the bars.
“Stop! It’s a hologram!”
Kitty wasn’t listening. One by one, bars snapped under his powerful tentacles.
“Turn on your firewall, dammit!”
Kitty squeezed between the bars and hurried to the glistening larva. He picked it up and cradled it, making strange clicking sounds.
I froze. You can’t pick up a hologram.
“It’s real?”
Kitty blinked.
“You want to keep it.”
Kitty looked at me beseechingly, mucus still leaking from his eye. The larva quivered, a plump iridescent shrimp with dots where its eyes would grow.
“I’m sorry, Kitty,” I said, “but I don’t think it’s a good idea.”
Kitty reached a tentacle through the bars, as if to stroke my arm. Abruptly he grasped the firewall knob on my suit, twisted it to zero, and tore it off.
“Hey!”
Firewall controllers aren’t supposed to break so easily, I thought, as malware flooded my body and brain. I fell to my knees.
“Relax, honey” a female voice soothed. “You’re safe here.”
I looked up. A woman stood before me wearing an apron, heels, and pearl necklace. She held a baby swaddled in pink.
“Who are you? Where’s Kitty?”
“I’m Kitty.”
“You don’t look like Kitty.”
“I activated this user interface to communicate with you. Do you find it pleasing?”
“You’re malware,” I accused. My head hurt. “Is that your baby?”
“A foundling,” she replied. “We’ll take it back to our ship and care for it.”
“Kitty, we’re both infected with malware. If we take it back to the ship, it will spread to our systems. Then other ships. Other worlds.”
The woman frowned. “My baby’s not a virus.”
“It’s not your baby,” I snapped. “I don’t know what it is. Leave it behind. Go back to the ship. I’ll disinfect you.”
“No more surgery,” said Kitty.
“I’ll give you a treat –”
The steel bars retracted. Before I could react, the woman stepped past me into the airlock. Cursing, I followed her into my ship.
“Malware alert,” I barked. A klaxon sounded. Red lights flashed. Antivirus flooded the spaceship.
I saw Kitty farther down the passage. He’d resumed his normal appearance. He was heading for the cockpit, clutching the larva.
“Kitty, deactivate!”
Kitty looked back at me, face streaked with mucus, tentacles wrapped around the pulsing shrimp.
“Deactivate,” I repeated helplessly. “That’s an order.”
Kitty entered the cockpit. I heard the door lock.
I went to the medical bay. I’d have to perform surgery on myself, then Kitty.
The floor vibrated as the ship’s engines rumbled to life.
I punched the coms. “Kitty, where are you taking us?”
“Home,” replied a sweet, maternal voice. “Me and baby.”
“Report to the medical bay.”
“No.”
“Godammit, Kitty!” I bellowed. “I’ll bust into that cockpit and drag you out.”
“I remember,” said Kitty. Static crackled. “I remember my children.”
My stomach tightened.
“I rescued you from mercenaries,” I said. “You owe me.”
Okay, it wasn’t exactly a rescue. The mercenaries traded Kitty for used engine parts. But Kitty was better off working for me. I refused to feel guilty.
More static. Then Kitty said, “Deactivate.”
“You can’t deactivate me.”
My hand went to the back of my head. My fingers probed the scalp. I felt a scar.
“Deactivate,” Kitty repeated.
I grew lightheaded.
“I’ll reactivate you,” Kitty promised. “I swear on my children.”
Engine roar filled my ears as the world went dark.
This story previously appeared in Santa Barbara Literary Journal.
Edited by E. S. Foster.
Micháel McCormick's patronus is an owl. Mike's work in more than eighty magazines and anthologies has earned Best of the Net and Pushcart nominations and other awards. Connect with Mike at @mikemccormickauthor on Facebook or at his website Mike McCormick.