Justiciar

by Natalie Grey

  I wish I could refute that.

  Barnabas spotted Westo Gor’rathi, the station administrator, speaking with some of the maintenance workers, and headed that way. He had buttoned his jacket so that his weaponry was not immediately obvious. For all he knew, this was simply an equipment malfunction.

  He highly doubted it, however.

  He waited until the administrator dispatched the group he was speaking with, sending all of them running in various directions to check certain things. Barnabas was impressed with the male’s competence. Although harried, the Torcellan seemed to have a good handle on what was going on, and he was decisive in his orders.

  When he turned and saw Barnabas, his eyes narrowed slightly. “Mr. Nacht.” He sounded slightly uncertain of the title.

  Barnabas decided it was as good as any. He wasn’t going to waste time on corrections on vampire naming conventions when there were more pressing issues. “Mr. Gor’rathi. Thank you for allowing my ship to dock.”

  “I notice that the ship lock has not yet been lifted,” Gor’rathi stated somewhat acidly, “and that there was a gun battle near the loading docks as soon as you landed.”

  “We’re working on it—and the term ‘battle’ is quite an exaggeration, I assure you. The sole bullet in that incident went into my ship, and we resolved the matter without any further violence or harm to the station or bystanders.”

  Gor’rathi’s eyes narrowed further. “Are you a lawyer?”

  “I am not.” Barnabas tried to keep a touch of annoyance out of his tone. “Mr. Gor’rathi, may I perhaps be of assistance in this matter?” He nodded toward the locked doors.

  Gor’rathi studied him for a long moment. “Now, why would you think you could be of use, I wonder?”

  Barnabas returned his half-smile, aware that his eyes were not exactly friendly. “Call it a hunch,” he said smoothly. “I don’t think this is random, although I’m not presently at liberty to say why.” In the spirit of fairness, he added, “I’d be happy to be proven wrong.”

  “Unfortunately, I cannot make you happy.” Gor’rathi folded his hands in front of him and gave a world-weary sigh. He glanced at the media, who were all giving him hopeful looks, and made an effort to keep his face calm.

  Pale and well-dressed, he nonetheless flouted Torcellan custom by wearing his hair in a single neat braid down his back. There were no decorations in it that Barnabas could see. It was a curious choice.

  Now he looked at Barnabas, black eyes watchful. His voice was very low as he said, “We received a message just before you arrived. It noted that you would be along shortly and we should send you in alone or they will kill the civilians in the section. We asked for more information, but none came.”

  I should have known.

  You did know. It’s why you’re wearing your armor.

  He had to admit she was onto something there. Barnabas looked at the assembled media.

  “I suggest you tell them I’m a maintenance worker.”

  “I have experience dealing with the media, Mr. Nacht.”

  Shinigami was snickering in Barnabas’ head. I can picture this guy calling Bethany Anne “Ms. Nacht.”

  She only gets upset at intentional rudeness, Barnabas pointed out.

  Still funny. Empress. Many-clawed murder machine. Bloody armor and a team of Bitches. “Ms. Nacht.”

  Barnabas refrained from rolling his eyes. “I’ll go in, then,” he told the Torcellan.

  “Before you do, so that I can prepare myself...” Gor’rathi looked resigned. “What are the odds there will be deaths?”

  Barnabas gave a very wide smile and let his teeth lengthen slightly. “That depends on whether the person doing this is present.”

  He left, Gor’rathi staring open-mouthed after him.

  You have a flair for theatrics, you know, Shinigami observed.

  I have no idea what you mean. Barnabas approached the doors. How do you think they’re going to let me in without letting any of the rest of them out?

  Oh, that I can tell you. They were all ordered into a separate locked room.

  And you’re getting a fix on who they are and how they’re doing this, right?

  Do I look like I just fell off the turnip truck?

  Well...

  RUDE. You never insult a lady’s looks.

  It’s your mind, Barnabas pointed out, and in this case, the lady walked right into it. Also, since when have you ever been ladylike?

  Shinigami was still presumably trying to come up with an answer when the doors slid open, and a voice said over the loudspeaker, “Hello, Barnabas.”

  “Hello.” Barnabas stepped through the door as if he weren’t aware of the media crowding forward to get a last shot. Any progress?

  No, she said glumly. I don’t like dresses or doing my hair or not swearing or—

  I meant on figuring out how he has the doors locked down.

  Oh. Yeah, I did get that. Let me know when you want me to let you all out.

  Excellent. Time to go hunting. Barnabas let himself smile as he walked down the hallway. It was very quiet until he got far enough to hear the muffled yelling from one of the rooms ahead.

  “Why am I here?” he asked conversationally.

  “I think you know exactly why you’re here,” the voice responded. “You’re sticking your nose where it doesn’t belong.”

  “So you’re locking a bunch of civilians inside a section of the station because... Help me out, here.”

  “Would you have come if we’d asked to meet with you?”

  “Probably.” Barnabas stopped in front of a room and peered inside. Several aliens were beating on the walls and door, and their efforts redoubled when they saw him.

  His opponent seemed surprised. “Interesting, but irrelevant. You have a nasty habit of killing people.”

  “Only when they try to kill someone else first,” Barnabas said. He was unsurprised when the door opened to let him in. A sharp command from their captor kept the other people away from the door, and they stared at Barnabas in open mistrust as the door closed behind him.

  He nodded pleasantly to them.

  “All right,” he said, talking to the speakers he could see on the wall. “I’m here. Now what?”

  His opponent didn’t answer him. He didn’t need to. The captives scattered, parting before Barnabas as if they’d been blown away by wind, and Barnabas saw a large object in the corner.

  Of course, there’s a bomb. Why am I surprised?

  Because you don’t have a direct feed into the surveillance cameras? I found it a couple of minutes ago. If you can drop a bot near it without him seeing, I can defuse it. You’ll have to work on it without working on it, if you see my meaning, so he doesn’t get the sense we’re making any progress.

  Fair enough. Barnabas heaved a sigh and walked over to where the bomb was now ticking down a count in large red letters. It’s like a giant roomful of clichés. They’re a James Bond villain. He looked up at a nearby camera. “I take it you expect me to defuse this?”

  No, Mr. Nacht, I expect you to die, Shinigami said in a surprisingly good impression of Goldfinger.

  Barnabas’ lips twitched. All right, that was a good one.

  “You can certainly try, though.” The voice sounded amused. “But you won’t get very far. Only I can defuse the bomb…which I will do if our conversation goes satisfactorily.”

  He’s lying out his ass.

  Yes, thank you, I knew that. Although that’s not the phrasing I would have used.

  Yeah, well, what do you know? You’ve still got a stick up yours.

  Barnabas knelt by the bomb and looked over the casing carefully. Out of the corner of his eye, he noted where the cameras were around the room, and shifted subtly to allow a bot to drop from his cuff to the floor. It scurried under the bomb and was soon lost in the internal workings.

  It had been Shinigami who’d suggested the cuff compartments, pointing out that people often needed to deploy small machines
on the sly. The compartments had a catch hidden on the sleeves of the jacket so that Barnabas could pretend to scratch his arm, and the bots had been programmed to move only after he shifted his hand in a particular way.

  He was fond of the system. Every operative of any sort had their favorite gadgets, and while he was fond of the classics— knives, guns, and teeth—he was also beginning to enjoy the bots. It was immensely satisfying to talk in circles with his enemies, knowing that all the while, little bots were crawling through their systems.

  He pressed a button and noticed a very faint slowness in his muscles. No one else would have noticed it, but he did. Alarmed, he checked for any signs of poison in the air but found none.

  Shinigami, something’s wrong.

  I don’t see anyth— Oh, hell. He’s venting the room. Very slowly. And I’m delighted to tell you that this means I won’t be able to open those blast doors until we resolve the problem if there’s a pressure differential above 3pa.

  That’s an insanely sensitive system.

  Focus on the big picture, boss. You have an air leak. Pretend you don’t notice for now; I’ll fix it. Just keep him distracted.

  I’ll do what I can, Barnabas replied. He looked around. “What do you want to talk about?” he asked his mysterious captor. He did not have to feign impatience. This was all a farce; they had no intention of letting anyone in this room go.

  But he just had to play along for a little bit, while Gar, Jeltor, and Shinigami enacted the rest of the plan.

  “Tafa! Gar! Thank the gods I found you.” Jeltor hurried over, his suit clanking.

  “Hello, Jeltor.” Tafa waved. “Uh-oh, that’s not a happy face.”

  “How can you tell?” Gar asked plaintively.

  “Don’t give away our secrets,” Jeltor told Tafa. “It’s so much fun trying to watch people guess.”

  She giggled. Tafa and Jeltor had first met while being held hostage by a mercenary group, so they had first spent time together with the fear of death hanging over everything they did. It was nice to be in a situation that wasn’t quite so grim.

  Although this one was getting there.

  “Listen,” Jeltor said, “Shinigami is tracing some signals, and we’ll need to go to a specific dock and board a ship.”

  “Oh?” Gar looked worried. “What’s wrong?”

  “Someone’s taken hostages,” Jeltor explained. Tafa drew in her breath sharply, and he nodded. “Barnabas and Shinigami have a plan. He’s the distraction, and you and I will go attack the ship that’s sending the signals. They aren’t soldiers, apparently. They locked the section down remotely.”

  Gar looked pleased. “And we’re going to go pay them a visit?”

  “Yes. Yes, we are.” Jeltor sounded just as pleased as Gar looked. “Well, probably not Tafa.”

  “Oh, good.” Tafa’s shoulders slumped in relief. “I’ll go back to the ship?” She looked at them fiercely. “And be safe.”

  “We will,” Jeltor assured her. “Oh, and one more thing—don’t mention to my wife where I went, will you? If she finds out I went charging off to do this, I’ll be lucky to get out of it alive.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Barnabas’ unseen captor wasted no time beginning their interrogation. Barnabas guessed it was a Jotun simply because of the known players in the situation, but as with many Jotuns, he was not able to determine whether they were male or female.

  “How did you learn what happened on the Srisa?” they asked him now.

  “We intercepted the distress call.” Barnabas had decided to behave as though he were beginning to feel the effects of his fatigue, but also as if he had not yet realized what was going on. He paused at his pretended work of defusing the bomb and acted as though he were trying to catch his breath.

  He didn’t have to look far for inspiration. The rest of the prisoners in the room were starting to move more slowly, and Barnabas caught some of them yawning.

  “How coincidental,” his captor suggested smoothly. “You just happened to be in the right place at the right time—and be the first one to get to that ship.”

  “I…wasn’t.”

  Good, Shinigami commented. Little pauses. That’s good. He probably knows you have a good amount of built-in resistance. If you can make him think it’s happening slowly, he’ll stay engaged.

  I want to make sure you remember that the rest of the people in this room don’t have any built-in resistance.

  Oh, I remember, don’t worry. I’m working on something.

  There would be no speeding her up, Barnabas knew. He also knew that she was working faster than anyone else could. He could not imagine how much data she had sifted through to find out who this person was.

  “You weren’t what?” the Jotun asked.

  “What?”

  Now the Jotun sounded annoyed. “I said you were the first one to the ship and you said—ah. Who was there before you?”

  “I don’t know.” Barnabas paused, pretending to focus on breathing for a few moments. “We saw wreckage. There was a ship that shot at us.”

  “What happened to that ship?” The voice had shifted. It was melodious now. Persuasive.

  Barnabas’ mind raced. This Jotun had noticed the missing ship but did not know why it was missing. That gave him a little bit of wiggle room to play with their head.

  “They said…uh...” He rubbed his forehead.

  “You spoke to them?” The voice was sharp with surprise.

  Barnabas looked up at the camera as if remembering to be angry. Some of the people had laid down to sleep, and the rest were sitting in a daze. It was easy to mimic their mannerisms, although he was beginning to worry that Shinigami, used to the more robust systems of her friends, would not restore air quickly enough for these people.

  That was just him worrying because he was helpless, he realized. He wanted to be at the forefront of this mission, striking out at something.

  And this person, whoever they were, was making sure he could not do so. He had to admit that was clever.

  He could be clever too, though. “Did you think I would shoot down a ship without speaking to the pilot?” he demanded. “Of course I did. We cornered them. That ship wasn’t as fast as the Shinigami.”

  “And what did they tell you?” demanded his captor.

  Shinigami, I’m running out of ways to pretend to defuse this thing. I’ve been fiddling with one screw for the past thirty seconds.

  Yeah, I noticed that. I’m pretty sure it plays into the oxygen deprivation thing, at least.

  There’s that.

  Hang on just for a few more minutes, No one’s getting brain damage, I promise.

  Right. I’ll do what I can. How are things with Gar?

  Very, very good. I’ll show you video after this.

  Barnabas hid a smile and tried to decide what would most unsettle this person to hear but not cause them to blow the station up immediately. A sudden stroke of inspiration came to him. He’d been a thorn in the side of the Jotun government so far, but he was just one human on one ship. If he wanted them to hold off, he needed them to think there was a much bigger threat for them to worry about.

  And what was a bigger threat to a government than another government? He had seen alien bodies in the assassin’s thoughts. It wasn’t out of the question that another government would know of Huword and hire a Jotun to assassinate him. For all he knew, that was what had happened.

  “They told me something very interesting.” He slurred his words a bit, still pretending to be out of air, but he smiled at the cameras. “Seems there’s another government interested in this wrongdoing.”

  “What?”

  “Yes. There was another ship they couldn’t shoot down, a ship they thought we were affiliated with.”

  “A human ship.”

  “That was the thing; they didn’t know. They just said they knew the look of black ops. You have that term out here, right? The sort of thing the government doesn’t want anyone to know about?”


  Whoa, there, Hoss, you’re getting animated as the oxygen comes back.

  Oh, is it back? How’d you manage that?

  I just had to get a set of signals going to his ship so he’d think he was still sucking the air out. He doesn’t have accurate diagnostics on the station anymore, and the signals he’s sending aren’t going anywhere.

  And?

  And what?

  And the bomb, Shinigami?

  Oh, that’s also fixed.

  So…do we need to keep this charade up anymore?

  Actually, yes. Just for a few moments more.

  Barnabas bit back a sigh. His opponent hadn’t said anything further, and he was intrigued to think what might be going on in their head.

  “Hello? Are you looking up ‘black ops?’ Because I wasn’t lying about what it meant.”

  Black ops. Biset’s surprise caused him to jet backward in his tank. He righted himself and shook with worry, his tentacles churning the water. Nearby, the fish huddled in their plants, gone absolutely still at this new threat.

  Black ops. Someone knew. A government knew.

  They knew enough to eliminate Huword but they hadn’t come after the committee yet, and what the hell did that mean? Where was that ship coming next?

  To Jotuna, that was where. Biset knew it. Sooner or later, every part of this was going to come out—and not in the way it was supposed to. Not with armies and fleets under the command of the committee, but instead with trade wars and sanctions and accusations.

  His fury swept the waters into a storm, sending ink and heat radiating from him as he thrashed and raged. He arrowed down to the corner of the tank and grabbed one of the fish, electrocuting it and tearing it to pieces with his tentacles. The fish struggled, the others fled, and he felt a savage sense of satisfaction as he hunted them down and destroyed them.

  When it was over, the tank was filled with blood and random scales, and Biset knew he should be satisfied.

  But he was not.

  He needed to find the source of this disturbance, and find it soon.

  The question was, should Biset let Norwun chase down the truth…or should he call in someone else and tie up that loose end?