Make Me Horizontal: Chapter 1 - Prologue

Chief Engineer Neil was a morning man. He was a fan of quiet shifts, one on one conversations and quiet introspection as he gazed into the stars. That's why, every morning at 6 AM on the dot, he would have his mug of robust coffee and set up the station's Supermatter engine a good three hours before anybody else was on duty. When the day was nearing its end, he'd help shut it down no later than half past ten. Neil was most definitely not a fan of late night partying, booze, and other such tiresome binges. That's why this morning was not a good morning. It was 5:57, his coffee was firm in hand and he methodically swiped his ID on the access panels of the airlocks leading to the engine room. As he reached his office and the card made contact with the grooves of the airlock's panel, the bush next to the door made its move!

Or rather, the clown inside of the bush. The honking bastard grasped onto the Chief Engineer's jumpsuit and yanked him towards him, and right on top of the slippery pink clown PDA. Before he could react, Neil was already toppling over, firmly planting his face on the cold, hard metallic floor tiles. The masked menace squatted down besides him, picking up his ID and the slippery PDA, while taking the opportunity to honk a bike horn right in his ear with his other hand, before standing back up and running away as fast as his oversized clown shoes let him. Neil's face grew contorted, as it burned red with impotent rage. He slowly propped himself up, careful not to stumble and fall, before seeing the clown scampering towards the Supermatter at speeds that shouldn't be possible. His thoughts, tranquil and serene less than a minute ago, were consumed by fury as he took off his satchel and rummaged around for the NanoTrasen standard issue baton he knew he'd left somewhere in there.

The clown chuckled to himself as he swiped open the Supermatter control room. Around him were dozens of pipes, pumps and sensors, all waiting to be touched, fiddled with and booby trapped. But before that, the grand prize stood just before him. The glorious, shining spire, the crystal itself! With an overzealous swipe with the card as subtle as his character, the clown had finally opened the last airlock separating him and the Supermatter crystal. He took a single step forward, his eyes fixated on the Supermatter.

"Rpasei eb Nra'Esi, eth edn si gihn and oinnhgt acn asve uyo moralst. Hte hrrorso beydon hte liev ear all ubt iunhbaektln, dan uoy alhsl peirsh lsnaoidge the tesr of uryo ca-"

The clown immediately withdrew his step and the voices were silenced, leaving nothing but the gentle hum of the crystal. On second thought, maybe he wouldn't go in there. As he began scouting the room he was in for pipes to touch, he heard the unmistakable noise of a telescopic baton extending. He turned around, no doubt Neil was after him. With a theatrical motion, his fingers pinched the flower on his chest, letting out a trickle of transparent liquid onto the reinforced floor in front of him. Seeing Neil's gaze lock onto him as he stormed towards him, the clown bolted, his shoes once again letting off honks with every step. Unfortunately for Neil, in his anger he was blind to the clown's latest trap and stomped right on the oozing puddle of space lube lying in his wake. Stumbling, he landed bottom first, bouncing off the floor and sliding forwards. Neil zoomed into the chamber, as the clown had forgotten to close the airlock behind him. Yet despite trying to brace himself, he slammed straight into the Supermatter crystal. The entire thing started glowing, and letting off an unearthly ringing. His last thoughts before his body and mind were disintegrated into nothing by the resonant shard were, "Oh fuck".

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

It was eight in the morning and Captain Emily Vargas was already in a meeting. Not a Centcomm meeting with those insipid officials and mindless businessmen where the monotonous drone of corporate buzzwords and endless slides of financial reports were enough to send a spaceman to sleep, nor a weekly staff meeting, an organized yet casual routine, with each head of staff expositing their weekly report quickly and concisely. This was an emergency meeting, which meant empty seats, interruptions, tempers, absent staff, and less cohesion than their chief engineer's current molecular structure. As the other staff heads and engineering crew were bickering amongst themselves, with the CMO conspicuously missing and the CE not there for obvious reasons, Emily pounded the table with a clenched fist.

Silence. Emily cleared her throat before addressing the room. "Right, so let's set everything straight. There's only one thing I know for sure, that our CE just got fucking sharded by the clown. And I want answers."

The Head of Security leaned in, taking a puff of his cigar before grinding the premium tobacco into the ashtray. "Boys in red grabbed the clown before he left engineering. Bastard's in interrogation right now, ain't fessin' up to shit. Considerin' his record, boy's lookin' at a permanent sentence."

The Captain raised an eyebrow. "What record?" she asked.

"Somehow got into a BSL-3 virology lab and drank every goddamn bottle in there. Docs say it's a miracle he didn't end up with twelve different strains of AIDS."

Emily frowned as her jaw dropped slightly. This was the most retarded thing she'd heard all week, on a station that had eight concussions, five ethylic comas and two cases of Impedrezene poisoning in that timeframe. And it was Tuesday. James was not the class of man to pull a prank, so either some bored and disgruntled officer thought it would be funny to forge some records, or the clown really was that much of a nutcase.

"What does the footage suggest, James?"

As James opened his mouth to speak, a holographic pad flickered to life, projecting the shape of a female humanoid while filling the room with a soft blue light. The room's intercomm began blaring with a robotic, lifeless voice that interrupted the grizzled head of staff.

"Security footage suggests attempted theft of belongings. This caused severe human harm during the escape. Probability of being intentional 87%."

"Thanks AI, play it back will you," said Emily as she and the rest of the staff turned towards the tiny monitor embedded in the meeting room's side wall.

"Commencing playback."

The footage of the clown's devious assault played back from several different angles, as everybody got a good view of Neil's humiliating last moments. Once he slammed into the Supermatter, the screen went blank.

"Footage of interest has been shown," reported the AI in its monotone drone.

Emily's frown turned into a scowl. Manslaughter and reckless endangerement at best, murder and sabotage at worse, she thought to herself. Either way, that clown was serving time. "Right, James, once we're done I want a full investigation. Whatever turns up, minimum sentence is five years. Are we clear on that?"

James grinned, his face expressing enthusiasm and less-than-benevolent intent. "Perfectly so ma'am."

"Right then. Now that that's sorted, we need a new Chief Engineer," she added, staring at the engineering staff patiently standing by the door. A redheaded human female, a green male Unathi, a short human male, and a pink-furred female Felinid stood in the standard Engineering garb, while an older, bald human male stood in a similar outfit, albeit with blue highlights across the chest and arms, denoting his status as an atmospheric technician. "Kaiden, pull up the records for each engineer will you?"

The Head of Personnel nodded. "AI, pull up the records for Pepper will you?"

The hologram, previously standing absolutely motionless lowered and raised its head. "Affirmative," beeped the machine.

Kaiden continued. "As you can see, no criminal record, five years experience in the position, more than enough for a leadership role here. No serious medical complications. Human."

The captain, unconvinced by Kaiden's recommendation, inquired about the other three engineers and one atmos tech.

"Oh, none of them are really impressive," the HoP remarked, using his PDA as a remote to briefly flick through their records. "Medical issues, no real commendations, criminal records, lack of experience... the works."

Emily began stroking her chin while Kaiden dissed the engineering staff. Who to choose? The HoP was clearly playing favourites and not giving the full story, but that was something to figure out another day. She had to figure out who was best for the job. Suddenly, an idea struck her.

"AI, who fixed the Supermatter delamination?"

"Surely this isn't necessary, right?" Kaiden interjected.

"Uncertain," the machine vocalized, "Searching now. Searching. Searching. Footage found."

Several camera angles showed up on the monitor once more for all to see. On it, the Felinid could clearly be seen running into into engineering, putting on a radiation suit, and heading into the Supermatter chamber on her own. The footage played out for a few more minutes as she wrenched canisters, turned valves, and adjusted sensors. Lightning began to emerge from the supermatter, while nobody saw the cat-mutant get struck, the cameras were quickly taken out. Once the last camera in the chamber died, the AI swapped the static viewport for relevant data logs surrounding the incident.

Meanwhile in the lobby, Pepper walked in, grabbed some Donk Pockets and turned on the microwave before idly leaning against the table and started texting on her PDA. The Unathi and human male engineer were nowhere to be seen, while the atmos tech, previously fiddling with some canisters in atmospherics, had started talking into his headset and injecting coolants into the fuel line. Emily's mind was made.

"Bring up the Felinid's profile," Emily snapped. Kaiden started fidgeting and scrolling with his PDA before the AI brought it up for her. She looked at the photo, then the name, and finally the cat-creature in front of her.