Chapter 1
Mara slowly crept closer toward the containment room. The dark, narrow halls seemed to close in on her. The stuffy, musty air made it hard to breathe. She tapped her earpiece twice, whispered “ready”, and then she stepped onto the platform in front of her.
Immediately, an alarm started blaring and she heard distant footsteps. The edges of her lips twitched. It was something of a barely-there smile. Perfect.
She turned and started running the way she’d just come, tapping her earpiece twice again.
“They’re on my tail,” she said, keeping her eyes focused ahead. She heard the footsteps approaching faster, closer.
Right on time.
With barely a thought, she summoned some of the energy inside of her and transformed. Her legs lengthened, her arms grew more muscular, and she grew a little bigger. Her brown hair that was once long and tied up in a ponytail shrunk down until it was just a messy mop on top of her head. A typical male haircut, coupled with a now-male teen body.
Mara kept running, her stride lengthening because of her taller height. Her eyes were fixed ahead on where the hallway would soon turn. She glanced back to try to see her pursuers, but the darkness didn’t reveal much. She tapped her earpiece again.
“Mach 1, are you ready?” Her voice rumbled in her chest, deeper and more masculine.
The reply came a second later. “In position, Red.”
Mara nodded to herself. “I’m going…now.”
She stopped running, turning back to her pursuers. They quickly surrounded her. She was outnumbered. 8-1.
“Halt,” one of them commanded. A tall, fearsome-looking man stepped forward. Mara deduced that he must be the leader of the group, given that his uniform was black while the others’ were gray. “Stand down, intruder, or be killed.”
Mara eyed the others. She needed to drag this out as long as possible, to buy as much time as possible. After slowly sizing them up, she raised her hands, surrendering. She shook her pistol free from her belt and it clattered to the floor.
The man in the black uniform seemed a tad bit surprised that she was giving in so easily, but he didn’t waste another second. “We’re taking you hostage. Try to escape, and you’ll be fired at.” He stepped forward and handcuffed Mara. She didn’t resist.
He stepped out from behind her, nodding to his other men. “Check him.”
A few of the men in white uniforms stepped forward obediently to check her clothes. Mara tried to suppress a smirk. It just so happened that the body she’d chosen, with its messy mop of hair, concealed the ear with the earpiece. As the men went through her pockets and felt around her clothes, pulling some random pieces of paper and other junk out of her pockets, they didn’t even notice the earpiece. Echo, you’re a genius. The earpiece was so compact and tiny that it wouldn’t have even commanded attention had her hair not covered it.
After they’d searched her, she felt a hand push her forward from behind. “Let’s go.”
Mara obediently walked with them as the men surrounded her, clustered around her in a group as they walked her to where she presumed the cells were.
They led her down a hall, took a left, then a right, and the cells came into view. High tech, clear front walls with metal side walls that separated each cell from the other. The man in black pressed a code into a pad next to the first cell, and the clear door slid up. The men behind her shoved her forcefully into the cell, and the door shut closed. She moved to sit on the bench inside the cell, and watched the men leave.
Mach and the others had better have gotten the artifact.
Now all she had to do was wait. Assuming that they did in fact get what they came for, the rest of her crew would come back to get her. That was the plan. She would go in first, get captured as a distraction, buying enough time for the rest to infiltrate the containment room and snatch the artifact. Then, they could turn it in to the buyer who would pay tons for it. Easy.
The only thing she’d have to worry about was the time limit on her transformation.
The way things currently were, Mara had about maybe an hour left in the male body, or so she guessed. It took energy to uphold a certain form, which continually drained her. Even though usually it wasn’t anything too taxing, holding one form for too long could sap her of energy she could need later.
Well I guess…since no one’s here…I can take a break.
She exhaled quickly and transformed back into her normal form. She grew smaller, her hair grew longer, and she sighed in relief as she felt the feeling of being in a female body again. Her now smaller wrists easily slid out of the handcuffs, although she kept them on loose. She sat back on the bench, tilting her head back to look up.
Now she was waiting for a transmission from someone on the crew in her earpiece. The way things were, one of them was supposed to come break her out.
Any moment now…
Mara frowned after waiting a minute. How long is it taking them? She paused. Did they get captured too? Then she shook her head. Nah, otherwise they would be taken here and put in cells like me. So where was the transmission?
It came a few minutes later. But it was not the transmission Mara was hoping to hear.
“Red, this is Echo. We…barely made it off the spacecraft without getting captured. We secured the artifact, but…” He trailed off. “...we had to leave.”
Mara's stomach dropped. They…what? She clenched her hands into fists.
Echo’s voice continued in the earpiece. “We’ll come back as soon as we can, but you might be stuck there for a while. I’m sorry.”
Mara heard a faint “gimme the thing, dammit” and a moment later Spike’s gruff voice entered her ear.
“Red, you’d better be okay. We’re coming after you real soon. Damn guards were stationed in places we didn’t anticipate. Stay real, okay?”
Mara smiled. She slid her right hand out of its handcuff and tapped the earpiece, whispering under her breath: “I will, S-dog.”
The transmission fizzled out after that, and the silence returned. Mara leaned back against the wall, closing her eyes and taking a deep breath. Her fingers twitched with impatience. This is fine. Slight bump in the plans, that’s all. At least they got the artifact. That’s what’s important.
And I’m fine here on my own. It’s not like this is anything I wasn’t prepared for.
She heard a noise. A bang, and then footsteps approaching from down the hall. She looked up in surprise, and quickly morphed back into her male body. A second later, the door to the room hissed open, and a boy stepped in. His jaw was set, expression unreadable but unmistakably cold. He strode over to stand in front of her cell, and without giving her a single glance, he leaned against the wall next to the cell, crossing his arms.
Mara shifted slightly to get a better look at him. He was tall, taller than her even in her male form. He was fit, slender but not overly muscular. A light brown fringe of hair fell over his forehead, the tips brushing his thick eyebrows. His hair was a little messy. He was wearing a simple black T-shirt, with dull blue pants.
Mara instantly took note of how he wasn’t wearing the same uniform as the other men. In fact, he seemed to just be wearing something closer to regular clothes. He seemed to be much younger as well, maybe only a year or two older than herself.
Mara moved a little closer to see him better, trying to make as little noise as possible. The boy seemed to be staring at something on the other side of the room, although when Mara followed his gaze, she couldn’t see anything of interest. It was just a gray metal wall, after all.
Suddenly, he glanced up at her with piercing blue eyes. “Don’t cause trouble, or something will be done about it.”
Mara's eyes widened at the abrupt command, but she nodded carefully and kept her mouth shut.
This is going to be a long night, she thought, glancing back at him.
