I didn’t want to go digging into the arach clans. I hadn’t known they existed before this mission, and I would be just as happy not knowing they existed, now. Andreus’s reason for unleashing a virus on the station was becoming painfully clear, since there was nothing like a plague to have a planet indicted, and a solar system made a no-go zone. Isolation in a can, so to speak.
I shivered. If any of the ships that had gotten off the station had taken the virus to the adjoining sectors, then Andreus would have succeeded in isolating the system without losing the station, or blowing the warp gates. InterGalPol would have locked it down tight, until a cure could be found. No wonder he’d wanted Treivani. She’d survived any number of plagues while under Blaedergil’s care. He’d have been able to isolate the cure for enough of Blaedergil’s infections to keep the remaining population of Costral healthy.
And I guessed it wasn’t for trade.
“Only fools believe the arach trading line,” Delight said. “Unfortunately, the idea of making a lot of credits makes people stupid. Andreus wouldn’t have known what was coming until it was too late—and once he’d come under the influence of an arach queen, he wouldn’t have cared.”
I didn’t want to know what a queen could do, and Delight didn’t enlighten me. We ate the rest of the meal in silence, and I followed Doc out the door.
“There’s a reward for alerting the authorities to an impending arach invasion,” Doc told me, “as well as one for identifying collaborators. Make sure Mack puts those claims in to Odyssey when he writes up their invoice.”
I stared at him, wondering what made him think I would be anywhere near Mack when he was billing his employers.
“Well, just check to make sure he hasn’t forgotten,” Doc grumbled. “I could do with the extra cred.”
I wondered what for, but it didn’t seem polite to ask, so I just nodded. The further down the hall we got, the more the time on the arach ship caught up with me. Fatigue made me want to sleep, but I didn’t say anything; Mack said this was important, and nightmares lurked at the edges of my mind. There was something mildly threatening about sleep.
We moved past the rec room, and into a quiet section where corrals were set around a bank of central computers. I stopped. This was new to me. Doc turned back.
“Library and research section,” he said. “We keep these separate to the main ship’s systems, in case someone downloads a bug. These things service the simulators, too.”
They had sims? I felt my interest spark. I hadn’t encountered simulators until after I’d started at Odyssey. Axe had insisted on dragging the Specials out to one of the local gaming centers once a week, and putting us through our paces. Okay, he’d enjoyed kicking our tails in the various zombie apocalypse games he’d found—didn’t enjoy it so much when I returned the favor.
“We have more than games,” Doc said, “but, right now, we need to know which arach fleet we’re dealing with—or if we’re dealing with an entirely new one.”
There was more than one?
He patted my shoulder.
“You have no idea, kid. No idea...”
I wasn’t sure I wanted to, but he led the way into a booth, and pulled out a chair.
“Take a seat, and plug in,” he said. “We need all the arach footage you’ve got.”
“Do you want the stuff from the labs?” I asked, and I could see I’d surprised him.
“What stuff?” Doc didn’t like surprises.
I didn’t answer him, just jacked in, and then discovered I already had an account.
“Man was awfully sure of himself,” I muttered, and Doc snorted.
“Standard practice,” he said. “You’d have found that out if you hadn’t gone running off with the first sweet-talking AI you met.”
“What’s my password?”
“About that...” and Doc pulled out a small tray.
“Oh, Hell, no!” I said, and tried to push my chair back.
“You and whose army?” Mack asked, standing behind me so I couldn’t move an inch—and I hadn’t heard him come in.
I twisted in the seat, preparing to slide out the side—and discovered that Tens was blocking my way. He reached down and grabbed my hand, even as Mack rested his hands on my shoulder.
“Come on, Cutter,” Mack said. “It could be worse.”
It could? I glanced up at him, and Tens lifted my arm, hit the pressure point that left it numb, and pressed my thumb against the pad.
I yelped as the needle inside it, punched into my thumb tip, but Tens applied a self-adhesive dressing to the wound, and laid my arm on the desk in front of me.
“The feeling will come back, soon,” he said, and left as silently as he’d arrived.
Mack stayed while the machine verified my DNA, and then left to drag a chair into the cubicle. Doc settled himself into the seat on my other side, and logged himself into the console, followed by Mack.
“Standard procedure,” he said. “Everyone using a terminal has to log their presence. If they don’t, we log them out, and then come and ask why they piggy-backed into the system. It’s murder on saboteurs.”
He sounded like there’d been more than one of those, and I shivered. I didn’t like thinking that even here, in a place I was coming to think of as sanctuary, there was danger.
“Don’t worry, Cutter. Crew we’ve got now? You should be safe. You’re the newest member we’ve had in the last six standard.”
“Years?” I asked.
“Yeup.”
“Load ’em up,” Doc said, sounding impatient. “I haven’t got all night.”
I created three files: one titled “Lab_Critters”, one titled “Corovan_Estate_Arach”, and one titled “Arach_on_Ship”.
“Lab critters?” Mack asked, but I didn’t answer, just uploaded the footage of what I had thought were spider-human hybrids, when I was being attacked by them in the labs.”
“Holy shit,” Mack said. “Tens, are you getting this?”
“I got it during the battle,” Tens said—and that had been something I hadn’t known.
He’d been there?
“Yeah, I was there,” and I don’t think I’d ever heard Tens sound so tired.
He didn’t add any more, though, and I went through the files stored in the implant, putting the relevant clips into their folders. Doc, being the systematic guy he was, started with the arach on the ship.
“Wh...” I started, and then just shrugged. What the fuck ever. I’m sure it made some sort of sense somewhere.
“Priority order,” Doc said. “Your lab monsters aren’t it, but these bastards hit the warp point before Odyssey’s ship could get to them.”
“Did they wing it?” Mack asked, and I stilled.
Odyssey had fired on the arach ship?
“They can’t be sure,” Doc said. “All we know is that it hit the warp point wobbly, but went through.”
“And?”
“That point? No one’s following them through that. Not even FedExplore have put ships through it, yet. They’re too busy plundering other parts of the galaxy.”
“Ooh, that’s new,” said Delight, and reached in over my shoulder to mark her presence with the machine.
We all looked at what was on-screen, and Doc wriggled his chair a little closer.
“New new?” he asked, and Delight nodded.
Doc flicked to the next image.
“What about this?”
“Uh huh.”
“And this one?”
“Yup. All new.”
Doc turned in his chair and looked at Mack.
“What do you think, Mack? We hand these over to Odyssey’s boffins, and let them have at?”
Mack stared at the screen, then looked down at me.
“How much footage is there?”
I clicked on the file properties in my implant, and he whistled, then backed up a few steps. I watched the computer screen flicker, noting his log-out.
“Come on, Delight,” he said.
“Looks like we need to talk.”
The screen flickered a second time, and they left the cubicle.
“Shut it down, Doc. We’re done here, unless Odyssey decides it needs us.”
“Sure thing, Mack.”
Doc turned further to watch the two of them leave, and I shifted enough to see them go. When they’d left the booth, Doc turned back to me.
“How do you feel about having another way to log in?” he asked, and I stared at him trying to work out what he meant.
“Instead of having to donate blood each time?” he added, and I glanced at the computer, remembering what had been required the last time.
“Please?” I asked, and Doc smiled.
“Here,” he said, and showed me how to set it up so I could log in with my implant.
“But only inside the rec center,” he added. “We’ve shielded it so the two systems don’t talk, and there’s no wireless crossover.”
I wondered if I could find one.
“Tens set it up,” the Doc told me, “but you’re welcome to try.”
Tens had set it up, had he? Well, challenge accepted.
34—The Skymander Debrief
The challenge had to wait. Once I’d logged out, Doc took me back to medical, and gave me a once over just to make sure I was okay.
“Hit the sack,” he said, when he was done. “You’ll be reporting to Mack in the morning.”
“What time?”
“Oh-dark-hundred,” Doc replied, which was hardly helpful. “I’m sure you’ll work it out.”
Oh-dark-hundred? It was always dark in space—and Doc snickered. Yeah, sure. Laugh it up, old man.
“I can still kick your butt on the mats.”
There was a part of me that disagreed with that, but the rest of me made sure it stayed real quiet. This was not a theory I wanted to test. I left the med-center listening to Doc making soft chicken noises under his breath and pretending I couldn’t hear him. I was way too tired to take him on, and he was way too old for this kind of shit.
I set the alarm for early. Oh five hundred seemed about right, but I couldn’t be sure, so put it back another hour.
Mack woke me up at three.
He just waltzed into my cabin, turning on the lights as he came.
“Up,” came through the implant, as he pulled back the covers, and took two steps back.
I came out of the bed like a shot, hitting the floor in my bare feet, and going in swinging, before I’d registered who it was.
“Do you bloody mind?” he asked, after the first hit connected, and he’d blocked the next three, by which point I really was awake.
I blinked. “Sorry. I’ll go get dressed.”
And he’d raised his eyebrows, folded his arms, and leant back against the wall.
“Move your ass.”
I don’t know why I felt guilty. He’d been the one to set a meeting without telling me, and without giving me the time. Ass.
“And mind your manners.”
Sure thing, boss, I thought, grabbing a uniform hanging in the closet, snagging some underwear, and vanishing into the san. All I could think was that it was a good thing I didn’t sleep in the nude.
“As if that would change anything.”
There was just no answer for that, so I showered in silence, trying to work out a way to get some privacy back. I wondered if it would do any good to ask Mack, and then discarded the idea. I doubted he’d understand.
“Coffee?” he asked, when I emerged.
“Sure,” I said, and he pushed off the wall and led the way out.
Once we hit the corridor, though, he surprised me by heading towards the control center, instead of the caf.
“I’ve got a call to make,” he said, catching my curiosity. “You’re invited.”
Funny how it didn’t sound like I had an option to decline.
“You don’t.”
“About that,” I said, meaning him in my head, and not the option to decline.
“No,” he said.
I wanted to ask why, but didn’t want to sound like a whiny kid, and, for some reason, Mack chose not to comment. As we hit the control center, I wondered who Mack wanted to call at this time of the morning.
“Skymander,” he said, and, as we entered, I saw why.
Melari Hazerna was waiting, Tens by her side. She smiled at Mack as he entered, sparing the briefest flicker of a glance for me, before giving Mack her full attention.
“Thank you,” she said. “Tens has told me how you saved me.”
Way to make a girl feel invisible.
I followed Mack across the room, letting him stand on Melari’s other side, as I took up station beside him. I couldn’t work out why he’d want me with him, given I hadn’t been there when they’d pulled Melari’s fat out of the fire.
“No, but you made sure I was able to reach her in time,” Mack said. “If you hadn’t stopped the arach...”
It was the closest he’d come to saying thank you, and I didn’t know how to respond. Having my ass kicked, even when I was right? That I could handle. Being thanked? Even when I’d earned it? Not such an easy ride.
“You are sooo messed up,” Tens said, and I felt my face flush with embarrassment.
“Enough,” Mack said, and the forward screen revealed the lounge room in which we’d first met Skymander and Treivani.
Their faces lit as soon as they caught sight of Melari, and her face reflected their joy. It made me wonder exactly when they’d formed their happy little triumvirate. Mack nudged me in the ribs, and I focused on the screen.
I watched the smile fade from Skymander’s handsome face, as he turned to Mack.
“I see you completed your end of our bargain,” he said. “Does Odyssey know?”
“Odyssey are aware.”
“And do they approve?”
“They are happy we have rescued your betrothed, and the Lady Treivani’s sister,” Mack replied.
“But?”
“They do not approve of your methods of choosing a partner.”
Skymander’s face darkened, and Treivani moved swiftly to his side, slipping her arm through his and gazing up at him. The change was instantaneous, as though she reminded him that Odyssey’s attitudes were not necessarily ours, and were certainly not hers. I saw the tension leak out of Skymander’s shoulders, as he guided his wife to a seat beside him on the couch.
“Tell me of the mission,” he said, and Mack baulked.
“That is not standard procedure.”
Skymander named a figure, and Mack sighed.
“We reached Costral orbit at oh-nine-hundred,” he said, “and entered High Costral Station. Cutter and the Odyssey agent, Delight, infiltrated the station arm housing Corovan Chemical at eleven-hundred. By this stage, Andreus Corovan had enacted his plan to infect High Costral with the virus, and all ships on station air were also infected.”
Treivani’s jaw dropped, but Skymander’s expression turned to stone.
“We called for Odyssey assistance, and Cutter and Delight were able to resolve the situation in the laboratories, using the delivery system that had been utilized to deliver the virus to deliver the cure. We apologize, but the cure is now publicly available, due to the need to save the station, so that we could proceed with the mission.”
Skymander moved his hand, as though signaling that it didn’t matter, and Mack paused. Skymander’s mouth opened and closed a couple of times, but in the end, all he said was, “Continue.”
“There was a short delay before we ported in to Costral,” Mack continued, and then went on to describe the mission to Andreus Corovan’s isolated stronghold. “We sent the Lady Melari straight up to the ship, and followed some time later.”
Skymander’s interest sharpened.
“Why the delay?”
“We were captured by an arach expeditionary force.”
“Arach? On Costral?” Lady Treivani had quite forgotten her husband, and was out of her seat and approaching the scre
en.
“Yes, Lady Treivani.”
“How many? And where?”
“We don’t know how many. The ones we encountered were at the Corovan stronghold, and on a ship heading out of the system. We were fortunate to escape with our lives.”
“And the planet?”
“Costral is safe for the moment. Odyssey are conducting an investigation into the depth of the compromise.”
Lady Treivani subsided, and I watched as she pulled her courtier’s armor back into place.
“Thank you,” she said, and glanced at Skymander. “I’m sure Clan Hazerna will be in touch with Odyssey on this matter.”
Looking at the determination on her face, I, too, was sure of it.
Once his wife had re-seated herself at his side, Skymander looked at the screen.
“We will meet you at High Costral in three standard days, so that the Lady Melari can transfer to Skymander’s Flag. In the meantime, I trust you will make her stay as comfortable as possible aboard your ship.”
Mack tensed, as though he’d received an unpleasant surprise, but then he cleared his throat and replied.
“Certainly, Lord Skymander. We will keep her safe.”
And Tens moved swiftly to his console and made a few adjustments that I had a feeling Delight wasn’t going to like. Skymander ignored him.
“The cure. I take it you have the formula, also?”
“Of course. We have the developmental files, as well as the formula for both variants, and possible paths of further research.”
Skymander sat a little straighter.
“And do you have the names of the scientists, too?”
“They are currently under Odyssey protection,” Mack told him, and Skymander smiled.
“So they are no longer in Corovan’s employ?”
“No.”
Skymander’s smile grew broader, but he didn’t try to garner any more information on the matter. It wasn’t hard to figure out that he had the resources to discover their names for himself, and would try and employ those scientists before anyone else could. I wondered if Odyssey would let them go.
“Your contract closes with the delivery of those files, any samples of the virus and its cures, and, of course, the safe arrival aboard the Flag of the Lady Melari Hazerna.”
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