Omega Station

Omega Station

Prologue: A brief history of Omega Station

         This story starts like many stories start. Or maybe it doesn't it's hard to tell but it seems like a lot of stories start this way. And by this way I mean somewhere in the bowels of a dungeon deep beneath a mighty fortress. Only this fortress is a space station, a massive undertaking to build the galaxies largest mobile military platform. Capable of housing a small planet of people in side its massive structure, this once noble undertaking has taken a serious turn in the past decade.

         The station, once built for the policing of the galaxy, was a joint effort by the United General Alliance as a massive deterrent to any possible threat. It was in the grips of war though, an internal civil war for control of the station.

         On one side you had the raggalians, a once civil species turned monstrous from years of gene manipulation which left them horribly mutated but tremendously strong, the arraras, a nomadic species of deep space dwelling beetle-people who only landed planet side to resupply, and the norrigans,  a species of bird people who resembled the owls of earth and were vastly intelligent.

         They believed they had a right to control the station, since they thought they put in the most work. Since the norrigans designed most of the the station and the arraras built most of it, since they could function in space with out suits, they felt like control should rest with them.

         On the other side were the zaganaughts, a reptile species that needed to be in thermal regulator suits to keep themselves at a nominal temperature but were cunning traders, the gazaans, a species of cat people who were considered the best infiltrators in the galaxy, and the nalarra'ians, a species of two symbiotic animals who combine together to make one intelligent creature.

         They believed they had right to control the station on the grounds that the zaganaughts nearly funded the entire project and that the gazaans kept it all secret from the rest of the galaxy.

         In the middle of it all were the humans. They themselves wanted control but only to stop the others squabbling. They were also in the middle because they not only helped design, fund, and build the station but they also worked hand in hand with the gazaans many times to keep the Regulus Collective from obtaining the plans to their ultimate tool for peace.

         This is where it all started though. The unifying of the galaxy started right there in the prison of this mighty space fortress. There in its deepest bowels was one of the few prisoners to revive Ultra Solitary Confinement but not for his crimes but for his words...

Part One: Some one did what!?

         There he sat with his back against the wall of his tiny cell, barley enough room to lay down at what he assumed was night. There was no light in the room. He would have gone mad because of it had a guard not slid open his food door for an hour a day, to let the hallway light shine in.

         The walls of his cell were cold and black, made of negatonium, a substance so dense it could only be chiseled into the shape you needed with other negatonium. To his left was a small metal toilet and on the floor was some blankets and a pillow.
He was assured that this wasn't regular treatment for an inmate in Ultra Solitaire. He was assured he wasn’t a regular prisoner.

         'A political prisoner,' he thought to himself as he fumbled around in the dark for something. After a moment of searching he found the soft blue rubber ball he was given to amuse himself.

         He took a breath and leaned back against the wall and began to bounce the ball against the the opposite wall. He had been in that cell for almost six months with that little blue ball. He had learned quite well how to bounce it in the dark. He could hear it and just see it in his head at this point. It came with a lot of trial and error mind you but he got it down to a science.

         'Science,' he scoffed at him self as he bounce the ball, 'science is what got me in here...'

         He used to be an apprentice researcher under a norrigan scientist who had been researching a new type of laser weapon for the raggalian's ships. And that’s where all his troubles on this station had begun, when he went and worked for that Doctor. Doctor Hoorahllia.

         He earned his researcher apprenticeship by writing  an empowered essay on how their current weapons technology could be redesigned for peaceful, nonlethal applications. He had barley been their two weeks when the trouble began.

         The station, at the time, was nearing completion and tensions over control were riding high, but had not yet erupted into full a full blown civil war. The Council had not yet been disbanded and sessions were held every day to try and reach a conclusion.

         He grabbed the ball and stopped bouncing it for a moment. He squeezed it tightly at the thought of what happened to the council then dropped the ball and rubbed his temples. He sighed and stood and began to run in place to help him think. He knew he didn't get a shower but once a week but the running in place kept his mind and body sharp.

         'I wont let that happen twice,' he thought as he continued to run in place, the sweat starting to drip from his face as his box heated up from his body heat. The vent over head kicked in but it always seemed to be on the fritz.

         He thought back to his first week on the station. He was there to try and make a difference in the galaxy but what he found was a melting pot of corruption, greed, power lust, and fear. It was all a deadly combination. But you couldn't tell from the day to day activity.

         The different sections and levels of the ship acted like cities and each one was governed a little differently, which left lots of room for corruption and bigotry depending on who was in charge of where.

         He was fortunate however and was stationed in Dovawind, a city-sector whose primary goal was research and development and was governed by a human doctor whose career had included discovering the MedEvac Teleportation Unit or M.E.T.U, which allowed a wounded soldier or civilian to be transported to their nearest designated medical safe point.

         But even in a place governed by a kind and just man, unrest was brewing and the seeds of decent were being sown.

         He was given a small apartment on the east side of the city, and thinking back at how small he thought it was made him stop running for a moment and wipe the sweat from his brow.

         'What I wouldn't give to be back in my tiny apartment right now...' he thought as he took his shirt off and tossed it to the ground and resumed his run.

         His old apartment was nice in comparison to his cell, heck it was nice in comparison to his old house on the Earthling colony of Omicron. Across the street was a nice diner, where he got free meals for being Doctor Hoorahllia's research assistant.

         He had never actually heard of  Hoorahllia until an extranet mail informed him of the contest to be his assistant. He couldn't find any info on him either, learning later that it was the gazaan's doing, wiping the extranet of any info that could link to Omega Station.

         Apparently on Omega Station he was a big shot, working lightly during the day, making mostly researchers do the “heavy lifting” then going to Omega Central to hobnob with the biggest of the big shots on the station.

         But what wasn't apparent to him at the time was that Hoorahllia was a stone cold bigot.

         When he first started working for Hoorahllia, everything seemed fine. He was given some old out dated weapons, a research station, and a lab partner to work out his idea with. Kar'raak Noothragaal, or Nooth as he called him, was a stout zaganaught with a surly, pessimistic attitude and the man in the cell couldn't have asked for a better more loyal friend.

         He stopped running again as the tiny sliding door at the bottom of his cell door slid open and light poured in. He covered his eyes for a moment as his eyes readjusted to the light. A voice began to whisper through the slot but he couldn't hear what they were saying.

         He crouched down and inched closer to the door and whispered in a gravely raspy voice, “”What did you say?”

         “Jon,” are you okay in there, came back a gruff and familiar deep voice he thought he would never hear again.

         “Nooth!” Jon began to shout but slapped his hand over his own mouth to muffle himself. He tried to contain his excitement at hearing his old friends voice and brought his voice back to a tentative whisper, “What are you doing here?”

         He tried to peer through the slot but the light was still too over powering for his weakened eyes and all he saw was blurry shadows. He could make out the bulky frame of Nooth though, it was unmistakable even in that blinding light.

         “I managed to join the prison guard detail,” He began as he slid Jon's food plate through the slot, “It took me a hell of a long time to find you though, seeing as your legally dead.”

         “What?” Jon asked as he took his tray, “They wiped my records?”

         “Unfortunately it's worse then that,” he began but, looking over his shoulder finished with, “I don't have time to explain it all now friend, but don't worry. I have a plan to get you out of here. Just give me a few minutes. You'll know my signal when it comes.”

         He reached a glove hand through the slot and and Jon grabbed it and gripped it firmly and replied, “don't give your life for me, brother,”

         “I will if I have to, brother. Shak'ta Ra!” He snarled at the end in zaganaught tradition when going out to possibly die in battle.

         He let go of Jon's hand and pulled back. He slid the door closed, leaving it open enough for some light to pour through. Jon quickly scarfed down his soggy sandwich and and stale potato chips then gulped down his cup of water.

         He stood and he stretched and picked up his shirt and threw it over his shoulder then using the tiny beam of light, found Bob, his ball, and put it in his pocket. He took a deep breath and paced a few steps, hoping, waiting, praying silently for his friends success.

         He waited what seemed like hours but had only been a few moments, listening for anything, peering out through his light slight and into the hallway beyond so often. The hall was empty, except the other doors to other cells, and he had adjusted to the lights. He had studied this hall many times in the past, at least once a day for an hour a day. Just dreaming of a way to escape.

         'Something's wrong,' he thought as he stood back up from the door slit and paced again, 'I don't think it should be taking this long.'

         He had sudden horrible flashes of Nooth being captured or worse yet, killed, which made him worry all the more. He paced, and paced, and paced, back and forth, back and forth. His guts twisted up in side at the thought of his only friend on this entire station was dead. All because he had to open his mouth.

         It was six months ago outside Dottie's diner, where he ate every day, that it happened. The Hologram News Networks, which were on every other corner we're blaring out news at an alarming rate. He was in Dottie's with Nooth, eating lunch while thinking up ways to turn plasma projectiles into a nonlethal weapon when a commotion outside drew their attention.

         As they made their way out, Jon asked what was happening as a large group surged toward the news hologram. A fellow human stopped and replied hastily, “The council is dead! Some one bombed the council!”

         And with that sentence, Jon's stomach sank. It was only his second week there when it happened. He had been barley learning about the political strife on the station when it happened. But even he knew this was bad.

         He and Nooth gathered around like every one else to listen in but the news didn't offer much clarification. No one knew who or how they did it but the theories were numerous. That's when the schism formed, as the rumors flew at who was behind it and why they could have done something as terrible as this.

         And there, it began to manifest itself in the streets, as sides began to be drawn and people began to shout at one another. Even with no proof they found themselves at each others throats with racial slurs. Which erupted into a shoving match and just as it was bout to explode into physical violence, Jon stepped in.

         He was angrier then all of them because he was angry at all of them. He had already whispered to Nooth to go and fetch the only working prototype they had managed to fashion and he had brought it back just as a a raggalian and a nalarra'ian, who's anger head had won its debate, were getting in to a shoving match.

         “Here you go Jon,” Nooth shouted over the screaming as he shoved a remote control device with a big red button on top and a pair of noise canceling headphones, “I hope this knocks the piss out of them!”

         Jon put the headphones on and wore a seriously pissed off look on his face. He then grabbed the 'device' from Nooth, which looked like a high tech megaphone and began to push his way through the crowd. He could still hear everything, since his headphones were designed to block out the frequency which he was about to blare out for two-hundred feet.

         He looked over his shoulder to look for Nooth, but couldn't see him over the crowd. He got to about the middle, right next to the Holo-News terminal, and looked around at all the screaming angry faces. He frowned as he raised his device above his head.

         He waited a moment and then pushed the big red button on the remote and in an instant, every one for two-hundred feet, feel to their knees gripping at their ears or ear holes, or what ever the had, and all of them screamed out at once.

         Jon released the button a moment later but it took a moment for every one to regain themselves but they all looked at him as he shouted out at them.

         “What is wrong with you! What is wrong with all of you!” He shouted angrily, turning in a circle to look at all of them in their eyes, multiple eyes, or sensors, the rage and disappointment in his voice was enough to get any one to listen, “How dare you! How dare you besmirch the name of the council, and the men and women in it who died today! How dare all of you bicker and fight about which one of your people possibly started this!”

         The crowd was in a stunned silence, mainly because they were still a little phased by the sound blast and partly because Jon brandished his device at them like a madman with a gun, screaming angrily at them.

         He stopped though and took a deep breath and composed himself as he looked around once more.

         “Is this what we boil down to? Animals!? Ripping each other apart at the first sign of conflict!? Have any of you even posed the question that this might be an the Collective at work!?” Jon asked and shouted, ranting at them, most of them too afraid to move but some were moved by his passion and stayed, “ I can't believe this is what I have seen today! I can't believe any of us, none of the council races, could have perpetrated such an audacious and heinous act as this!”

         He was on a roll, and most were calming down and listening to him wholeheartedly when trouble arrived from above. The Omega Station Military Police, O.S.M.P, came soaring in just then on their hover bikes and in their squad cars.

         The crowd panicked and scattered but the O.S.M.P only focused their attentions, guns, and spotlights on Jon. Then a voice came blaring over their squad car loud speaker, shouting angrily, “Jon Doodmire! Please put down your weapon and put your hands above your head! You are under arrest!”

         Jon went wide eyed with bafflement but stooped down and set the device on the ground but slipped the remote down the sleeve of his coat, then slowly stood and raised his hands above his head but shouted back, “For what!?”

         “High treason! Conspiracy to commit murder! Murder and several other charges!” Came back the voice over the load speaker as a hover-bike landed near to him and an office stepped off and raised his gun at Jon.

         He was obviously human but wearing the standard O.S.M.P ballistic armor and helmet but he was only approaching Jon slowly. He whispered through the amplifier on his helmet just loud enough for Jon to hear, “listen kid,” came a gruff voice, “they know you didn't do it but you just gave some huge fucking speech in front of a news network terminal and now they want to pin it all on you to try and keep the peace. Don't you know these things record round the clock in case something happens in front of them?”

         Jon's heart sank as he took a step back, “What? How are...”

         “They cut your speech, we heard the rest over the radios, but the public only heard the first half of your ranting. They think your nuts, kid, he was inching towards Jon but moving incredibly slowly to eat some time.

         “Now look, you gotta hit me and make it believable and try to make it to an escape pod or something...” he was talking as quickly as he could and Jon couldn't hear it all but another bike was landing and he had to cut it short.

         Jon's heart was racing so he did the only thing he could possibly think of. He fell to he knees and put his hands behind his head and gave up. He thought if he could just get a word in in court he could possibly convince the judges that he wasn't a traitor.

         But he didn't. Because he never went to court. The moment when he gave up and they slapped the restraints on him. They took him straight to the deepest part of the station and burred him in the deepest darkest hole they could find.

         He slammed his fist against the negatonium wall of his cell and felt one of his knuckles break in the process, immediately making him regret the burst of emotion as he recoiled against the door. He slid down and sat there rubbing his knuckle. He prayed once more for Nooth's safety and was just about to give up all hope of ever getting out of that cell or ever standing on Earth again when the door fell open backwards behind him. He fell on his back, into the light and lay there looking up at the ceiling for a few moments. He sat up, wide eyed and confused, sliding on his butt to face the other direction.

         He stared down the hallway in which he had been dreaming of escaping to for the last six month...