Chapter 1: LIFELESS EYES

Captain's Office

13:44

The monitors flickered, showing chaos—armed intruders rushing through the corridors, bodies falling in their wake. But the captain watched it all unfold, unmoved, as if it were a scene from a movie.

Behind the imposing burnt mahogany desk sat Captain Chez Deric, his eyes fixed on the wall of monitors, displaying the chaotic scene. One of the guards shifted uneasily. This guard's name is Barry, his usual arrogant smirk now gone and replaced with nervous tension.

Among the crew, Barry was known to have stayed on despite his conscription being up eleven months ago. He relished his role as an enforcer under the captain's brutal reign.

"Captain," Barry growled, his hand twitching with pent-up energy. "The alarm."

On the screens, the intruders opened Cell 7 and 8 – the cells that held the rebel prisoners – each with a massive bounty on their head. More intruders kept appearing. The rebels must have gotten in through one of the docking bays. Their invasion shifted to the front of the ship, towards the Captain's Office.

"One chance," the captain murmured cryptically, watching the petite figure of an escaped prisoners.

There was an alarm button on the panel next to the captain's desk. But despite watching the prisoners escape and the assault on the crew, the captain refused to raise the alarm.

Barry looked back and forth to the monitor on his left and the captain. He addressed the captain again. "Sir, the alarm." The captain shifted his cold gaze from the monitors to Barry – as if warning him to be silent. Then the moment passed and his eyes returned to the monitors.

The other guard was sweating heavily. His name was Seth. Seth was afraid he would die that night. He was a new recruit – his two years onboard the Corpse Flower had just begun. He briefly considered speaking up as well. Behind the captain the liquor cabinet rattled with the distant tremor of an explosion.

Barry shifted uneasily, his hand twitching near the pistol strapped to his thigh. The captain's eyes flicked to him, cold and unblinking, a predator sizing up prey. Barry hesitated, then lunged for the alarm.

BANG!

The shot came so fast Seth barely registered the movement. One moment Barry was standing; the next, he was crumpled on the floor, smoke curling from a neat hole between his eyes. Seth's stomach churned as the acrid stench of burnt flesh filled the room. The captain hadn't even looked away from the monitors. Seth's skin turned ashen and his pulse hammered in his ears as his instincts screamed for action. His chest heaved, each breath faster and shallower.

Seth squeezed his firearm, trembling slightly, and looked at the captain. He wanted to run, to raise the alarm himself—but Barry's lifeless body was a stark reminder of what defiance earned. A shutter from a distant explosion rattled the artifacts of maps and decorative weapons on the wall behind the captain's chair.

The captain lounged in the large black leather chair, his features looked as if carved from stone, his gaze fixed on the monitors. Seth's skin prickled under the weight of those eyes—like the eyes of a shark he'd once seen in a movie as a boy: lifeless eyes. A chill crept over him.

Then, without warning, a spark flickered in the captain's expression. He blinked, cleared his throat, and with an unnervingly calm motion, set his pistol on the desk. The metal glint ominously in the light.

The captain's hand emerged from the desk drawer with a crystal decanter of amber whiskey. He poured two glasses and leaned back in his chair, his unspoken thoughts weighing heavily in the room as shouts of alarm and distant gunshots sounded from outside in the hall.

"Have a drink with me, Seth."

Terrified to decline, Seth edged warily around the lifeless body, every step a test of his resolve. His fingers, reluctant and trembling, peeled away from the rifle to accept the cold crystal glass. The whiskey slid across his tongue, deceptively smooth, but its warmth burned down his throat, leaving a haunting trace of oak and delicate florals.

Captain Chez tossed back his first glass with practiced ease, the amber liquid vanishing in a single, sharp motion. Without hesitation, he reached for the decanter, pouring again. Just as he moved to recap it, he paused, one brow arching in silent question.

Seth, reluctant but unwilling to refuse, extended his glass with a trembling hand. Chez smirked faintly and poured generously—whatever else his captain was, he wasn't stingy with his whiskey.

Three of the feeds on the monitors flickered then went out – indicating that the rebels had disabled part of the security system. Against the backdrop of gunfire, a sound that now seemed further away, Seth became lost in a confusing swirl of questions.

Why had his captain refused to sound the alarm? Surely he knew the rebel woman was coming to kill him like she had sworn. Why had he visited her cell earlier? The captain's deep voice shocked Seth from his thoughts; it too sounded far away.

"May as well sit and get comfortable," Captain Chez muttered, his voice heavy with more than exhaustion. The sigh that followed was deep and ragged, more groan than breath.

"We've got a lot of drinking to do."

Seth collapsed heavily onto one of the matching black leather seats, his firearm placed awkwardly across his lap. "Sir, aren't they coming for – " Seth's speech was slurred.

His movements grew labored and heavy, until finally, the empty glass tumbled to the floor, and his head fell forward onto his chest. The heavy breathing of a deep sleep followed.

Captain Chez's lips curved into a smile, but it was an empty mimicry of joy. He stared through Seth as if peering into some depressing abyss, a place only Chez could see. From outside in the hall, he heard the escalation of gunshots. The guard on the other side was shot and the cry of his death sounded down the hall.

"One chance, Miss Ford," he sighed as his own drowsy eyes began to close. "I hope you are ready to take it."

Just as the captain's head slumped onto his chest, the door exploded inward with a deafening roar, a fiery blast that sent a wave of heat rolling into the room. Shards of metal scattered across the floor, the impact rattling the walls and sending the liquor cabinet crashing to the ground. Smoke billowed into the room, thick and choking. A shadow passed under the doorframe, and silence fell.

The shadow shifted, stepping into the light. A soft, metallic click echoed through the smoke-filled room.

"Shit."