Phoenix Feathers, Part I Chapter 2

Disclaimer: Joss is boss, and all the money in the 'verse can't make these characters or this world into my idea. Although I'm working on that.

***

Phoenix sprinted down one of the Academy’s corridors carrying the chair, still connected to his arm by a pair of handcuffs, before him. Even though he made no noise and there were no other people in the vicinity due to the recent security alert at Shaft 7, he could not avoid detection entirely, for a guard was stationed at the entrance to the maintenance corridor.

Phoenix slowed to an unsteady shuffle as he approached the man, concealing the chair behind his back. The guard noticed him almost at once.

“Who let you out of school, boy?” the guard drawled.

Phoenix didn’t react, but continued towards him, eyes downcast. The guard seemed to notice that the two of them were quite alone, the realization of which brought Phoenix another second closer, but he was still a dozen paces away when the guard brought a two-way radio to his mouth.

Time seemed to slow for Phoenix. Sensory detail flooded unbidden into his consciousness, almost overwhelming him. He could discern individual threads of the guard’s uniform, could taste the cold air, could feel himself gliding across the smooth floor. He watched with detachment as his wrist flicked out, spinning the chair like a boomerang into both the guard’s radio and his face, smashing both and knocking him to the floor. Phoenix snatched the man’s handheld laser from its holster and trained it back down the hallway, but no one emerged from the adjoining rooms to investigate the brief commotion.

With the sidearm, Phoenix shot off the second pair of handcuffs and then searched the guard’s body for a keycard that would provide access to the maintenance corridor. Not finding one, he moved to the door to examine its locking mechanism more closely. He immediately recognized it as a Model 113 Tara Systems Electronic KeyLock, designed to be immovable and inaccessible after installation, unless a coded keycard was used.

Phoenix did not have a keycard, but he did have a highly powered government-issue laser pistol.

He positioned the barrel of the weapon so that the beam would fry the lock’s major circuit board at the point where the damage would be the least visible, and pulled the trigger. He tugged on the handle and the door slid open obediently. Phoenix dragged the chair and the guard’s inert body inside, then closed the door and surveyed his new surroundings.

The maintenance corridors ran parallel to the main hallways on each level of the Academy. Although they were not interconnected to allow Phoenix to get to higher floors and then to the surface, they did let him access the extensive network of wires and cables that channeled streams of data and electricity throughout the facility. Too, they were usually deserted but for the odd technician.

Staring at the wires, Phoenix began to formulate a plan that he calculated would greatly increase his chances of escaping.

Though a breakout had never happened before, the Academy had prepared quite thoroughly for that eventuality. The whole facility was located underground, with all entry and exit points heavily guarded and monitored. Procedure dictated that the Academy be locked down while sophisticated sensors attempted to pinpoint his location. Meanwhile, search teams would scour every level of the Academy and the land above it for the rogue “student.” Phoenix decided that he would have to wait for the searchers to spread themselves too thinly before he made his move, which meant a prolonged stay at the Academy. Given the certainty of internal scans and searches, there was only one place that he could possibly go.

Phoenix reached into the tangled mess of circuits, and, selecting one wire in particular, snapped it, then set off down the maintenance corridor.

***

In the Academy’s control room, Chief Supervisor Andre Titus was issuing a hailstorm of instructions to his staff. There was not a moment to lose, for each passing second delayed the recapture of the escaped subject.

“I want data on the shuttle- its licensed owner, range, speed, and probable destination. Patch us in to any sensor relays along their route, Priority Red. Monitor all frequencies for any transmissions they make, and for Buddha’s sake, will someone find out who they took?”

After a minute, the telemetry started to pour in. The shuttle in question had been identified as a very extensively modified long-range ship, capable of interplanetary trips thanks to upgraded engines that were clearly black market material. Its registration was a fake, but a good one.

Titus was already considering the possibilities. The collaborators would probably abandon the distinctive ship in favor of another, more innocuous one at their first stop, which meant a large spaceport into which they could disappear easily. They would doubtlessly have headed away from the Inner Planets and Alliance presence to avoid the feds. These hypotheses narrowed down the criminals’ options, but it remained for the sensor readings to determine the shuttle’s exact course once it left the atmosphere. One of Dr. Titus’ aides attracted his attention as he was dispatching a security detail to locate his subordinates, Doctors Mathias and Barnes.

“Sir, eyewitness reports and a roster count indicate that the subject who escaped to the shuttle via Shaft 7 was number 03.”

Titus felt sick. River Tam was gone! The Academy’s greatest success had been stolen! Titus finished gaping at the aide. His face was dangerously grim.

“Do we have a course plotted?”

The sensors operator shook his head.

“It’ll be another minute before they establish their final trajectory, and even then they could change course to throw us off their scent, sir.”

The aide shifted his feet uncomfortably and coughed nervously.

“Sir, the tally indicated that two subjects are missing.”

Titus froze and stared at the man.

“Who else?”

“Subject 04, sir.”

The screen in front of the sensors operator winked out.

“Sir, we’ve lost Sensors!” the operator yelped.

Dr. Titus ran to the man.

“Nonono! We can’t lose them!” He slammed his fist on the dead console.

The doors behind him opened, and a pale and bruised Dr. Barnes was escorted in. Titus snorted in disgust.

“Your patient got the drop on you, did he, Barnes? Because, as I’m sure you’ve noticed, he doesn’t seem to be about. Now he and River- River, Barnes! – are headed for the Outer Planets, and, thanks to our top-grade sensors malfunction, we can’t do a single thing to stop them!”

Barnes sat down heavily.

“Escaped? How?”

“Let’s find out.” Titus signaled to an aide. “Call up the security vids and put them up on the projector.” Barnes stood up wearily and the two doctors walked over to a corner of the control room. They stepped up to a wall which started to give off a low-pitched hum. For a few seconds, Titus and Barnes looked up at a blank wall. Then the air in front of them started to shimmer, displaying the holographic likeness of Simon Tam, dressed as an Alliance inspector. He was talking with Dr. Mathias, the 03 project supervisor who oversaw River’s training.

“Who is he?” Titus growled. “Run a search on all databases.”

“That’ll take days,” Barnes remarked.

“I know. Still, this wasn’t some random act. It was well thought out. I don’t know how he beat the scans- probably had inside help. Find out who 03 ever knew, and search for matches there. Then look in Browncoat files- they might have the connections to mount an operation of this kind.”

***

“Prissy! Where’s my coat!”

The outraged cry boomed forth from somewhere in the depths of the space freighter, and could be clearly heard from the ship’s bridge, where Priscilla Ganlen sat. Beside her, Nebula let out a giggle. Priscilla raised an eyebrow at the craft’s youthful pilot, and then sighed wearily. They both looked around to see the ship’s captain, Patrick Montgomery, stalk onto the bridge. Armed with a massive beard that preceded him into every room, he was a huge, bearlike man whose formidable exterior concealed a simple and friendly disposition towards his crewmates. At this moment, however, Priscilla saw in his reddened face a strong urge to punch something. Hard. Nebula, not entirely failing to stifle her laughter at his expression, greeted him.

“Ni hao, Monty. Has Cody tired of this mortal realm already? I thought you made it plain that he was to discontinue his coat-snatching capers.”

“Gorramn kid must have pinched it again,” Monty agreed. His eyes searched the small bridge for the culprit. Not finding him, Monty harrumphed and turned to Priscilla.

“Would you give me a hand finding that little weasel, Prissy?”

“Right away, Chief.”

She got up and headed down the corridor with Monty trailing and muttering about how the criminal would soon be eating his own wrenches for dinner bar some liberal use of divine intervention. Nebula watched them go, then turned back to the assorted screens of the pilot’s station.

“This isn’t going to end well, you know.” Behind her, a grinning boy poked his head out of a group of overhead supports, but lost his balance and dropped to the deck with a stifled yelp, flailing a large brown coat. Cody landed heavily, and took a moment to contemplate just how fortunate he was that there was such comfortable metal grating to break his fall. He got up and strode with a slight limp and a wounded pride to the copilot’s seat. Draping Monty’s sought-after garment on the seat back, Cody settled into the chair and folded his arms behind his head nonchalantly.

“Maybe. You know me though, Neb. I live for danger.”

Nebula shook her head self-pityingly. Whenever a life threatening mishap beset the ship, as it so often did on their interplanetary ventures, it was her own piloting skill that kept them from crashing until Cody’s frantic trial-and-error tinkering got them down. More than once they had nearly plummeted from the sky because Cody pulled the wrong wire or somesuch thing, although he denied it indignantly. But the two of them did make a good team, and Nebula couldn’t think of a mechanic that she would rather fly with.

Another bellowed expletive reached their ears.

“You probably want to hide yourself someplace else right about now, Cody. Like maybe locked in your room,” Nebula advised.

“What are you going on about now, Neb? I haven’t been anywhere near…anything. Today, at least.”

Cody winked conspiratorially at her, and crept stealthily out of the bridge, setting the coat swaying on the swiveling copilot’s chair. Nebula threw a sideways glance at it, then exhaled tolerantly. A beeping noise from a nearby console brought her to the edge of her seat. She reached for the ship’s intercom.

“Attention, crew: Be advised that I’ve had way too much coffee this morning, so sit down and buckle up. Atmospheric entry in 10 seconds.”

Nebula smiled evilly at the panicked voices that pleaded with her to go easy this time, and took the wheel.

The ship plunged into the clouds.

***

Joined by a queasy-looking Dr. Mathias, Titus and Barnes turned back to the recording as Simon Tam dropped to one knee. He slammed his ceremonial baton on the floor, ejecting a palm-sized sphere which burst over his and River’s heads. The miniature stun bomb produced a shockwave that swept outwards towards Mathias and the surrounding technicians, and-

The feed ended. Titus swore colorfully, but the recording switched to a hallway view as the siblings quickly made their way to Shaft 7. Simon helped his sister through the narrow opening, then slipped through himself and used another part of his baton to bar the entrance. Scant seconds later, a security detail appeared outside the opening. One of the guards fired his laser pistol uselessly at the blocked exit, while the other man yelled into his intercom.

“Security breach, Shaft 7! We’ve got a subject loose! Secure-”

Titus froze the image and turned to face the other doctors.

“We’ve got a serious problem, and we need to solve it, or heads are going to roll, starting with mine. At this moment there is a shuttle full of insane assassins that is heading out for the border moons, and we can’t track them. Even if we searched everywhere that they might have gone, there’s next to no chance of actually picking up a lead. These guys were pros.”

Regarding the paused holo of the Tams escaping the Academy, Barnes suddenly grew excited.

“Wait- there’s something…the events don’t match up. Here, the guard raises the alarm as Subject 03 is embarking. I’m guessing that they leave immediately?”

An aide confirmed it, and Barnes smiled.

“04 attacked me after I heard the alarm. He wouldn’t have had time to get to the shuttle before it left, and we’ve been completely shut down since then. He’s still here!”

For a moment, nobody in the control room moved. Then the room erupted into chaotic action as the new situation was attended to, with doctors shouting orders and aides tripping over each other in their haste to comply. Amidst the mayhem, Barnes sought out Titus.

“This is futile, Andre. We trained them to be unpredictable, to improvise. 04 won’t be found unless he wants us to find him.”

As Mathias joined them, he confirmed Barnes’ view.

“A full bioscan of the Academy turned up negative for anomalous brainwave patterns or for any students who aren’t where they should be. He’s gone.”

***

Phoenix, formerly patient number 04 of the Academy Project, hung upside-down from the ceiling and looked downwards as, far below him, the other patients were kept under watchful eyes in Holding. He then looked across at his target, the entrance to the narrow ventilation shaft which supplied surface air to the facility’s major chambers. It was not by any means easy to reach- it protruded from the ceiling not more than a foot and was blocked by a mesh filter.

Phoenix worked his upper body back and forth, swinging himself by the knees. Back and forth, back and forth he went, forcing himself into wider and wider arcs. When he reached the apex, his back nearly touching the ceiling, he released his legs and flung his arms out towards the air shaft.

For a horrible moment, it seemed as if he had miscalculated the distance, but then his fingers were scrabbling for purchase on the smooth vent’s exterior. Finding an edge, Phoenix’s fall was arrested and he hung, precariously suspended by his fingertips. He slowly transferred his weight to dangle from just one hand, and with the other he carefully worked the mesh cover off the vent. Phoenix pushed it aside and hauled himself upwards into darkness.

As he did this, he dislodged the tiniest amount of dust which had collected on the inside lip of the ventilation duct. The dust particles, spiraling gracefully downwards on eddies and currents of air, drifted around the heads of the students below him.

***

The guards were perplexed at the patients’ sudden change of behavior- Students were cavorting and gibbering madly, pointing upwards towards the ceiling and giggling.

The first guard to look in that direction saw a flicker of movement below the faraway ventilation shaft which could have been a pair of legs. The other guards saw nothing unusual, and laughed at the first’s strange notion. The guard, who did not know any particulars of the current emergency, feared for his job, but dutifully reached for his radio.

***

Phoenix was only halfway up the air duct when the first alarms sounded. The ventilation shaft was long and had not been designed to accommodate a person, but he climbed up and up, punishing his fingers and toes in his speed. At last he came to the end of the shaft, and pulled himself over the top.

He tumbled out into sunlight.

***