WinterStar

by Blaze Ward

  Or perhaps she had already been planning to die with the rest of them, if a Septagon was waiting for WinterStar at Azgon.

  Kathra considered her options. As Commander, she could just shoot Ugonna now, and let everyone know as much of the truth as they needed. But she needed to make an example of the woman, lest some future spy decide to try her luck.

  “Daniel, I need your help,” Kathra said, turning to face the tiny man, surrounded by so much taller women.

  His eyes met hers from under hooded brows, like a recalcitrant teen called to discipline.

  “How?” he whispered carefully.

  “You have seen the truth,” Kathra said. “Can you show the rest of us?”

  Whatever he had been expecting, this was not it. She watched his face fall slack in surprise and fear. His eyes lost focus before they found hers again.

  “Urid-Varg rode a victim,” Kathra said simply. “You ride the gem. Is there a way you can carry us?”

  Now the eyes were blinking too rapidly, shifting back and forth. According to Ndidi, he could occasionally speak with his ghosts, so perhaps she was watching him ask them something.

  “I can try…” Daniel offered weakly.

  “Do it!” Kathra commanded him in a stern voice.

  She had no idea what to expect, but Daniel reached out and took her hand in his. She could feel his tension in the sudden coldness.

  “All of you,” he whispered, reaching out his other hand as she watched.

  Kathra found herself looking at the room as if she was floating a whole deck above it with nothing in the way. The seven of them over here. Ugonna over there, growing rapidly more fearful, but not moving yet.

  In her mind, she became Daniel in a way she could not describe, other than perhaps he was indeed carrying her and the others on his back. She could taste the flavor of his fear, swirling like fog around the pillars of duty and strength holding his mind upright.

  Erin was there with her. Kam. Stina. Nkechi. Areen.

  All of them standing on Daniel’s shoulders as he carried them across a raging river in a storm.

  Suddenly, she was aware of Ugonna as another layer of consciousness below them.

  Kathra watched the rage and fear war with each other as they entered her mind. Already, the traitor was bracing herself to rush them. Perhaps to grab a gun from someone and kill before they finished her off. Perhaps to just knock them to one side and make it out the door.

  Kathra reached out a mental hand and grabbed the woman.

  “No!” she commanded in an angry tone.

  Suddenly, Ugonna changed. Stopped fighting Daniel. Stopped anything.

  The traitor stood perfectly still, eyes and mind unfocused and watching nothing.

  Kathra hadn’t meant to change the woman. Merely to order her.

  But Urid-Varg had been able to change anyone he pleased with his powers.

  Kathra could see where her hand had reached out and flipped a switch in Ugonna’s mind.

  How is this possible? Kathra asked the presence of Daniel that was all around her.

  You are me, he replied in a calm, detached voice. We must become one to do this thing. All of you are me.

  Kathra felt a gasp in her physical form. What could he learn about her secrets, if they were thus?

  But he had already been inside her mind. Had used her to write a secret message from Erin.

  That meant she was also in his mind.

  Kathra did not wish to violate his privacy, but she would perhaps never gain an opportunity like this again.

  She reached out.

  Daniel did not fight her. If anything, he felt the man’s mind guiding her towards some of the places she might not have found on her own. At least not initially.

  She watched him as a man. As a person.

  As a chef.

  All of his identify lay open before her, spread out on a table top like a jigsaw puzzle, except she could see how each and every piece went together.

  You understand, he said quietly in her mind.

  She did.

  Daniel was more at risk of her asking him to do too much evil, than he ever was of doing it on his own. Bright lines were apparent, with footprints in the snow walking right up to them in many places, and crossing only a time or two.

  She felt him redden with embarrassment as she probed those places.

  The Left Hand of Evil. She had not truly understood the implications before now, but she could see all the places where his power could take him in a moment of weakness or rage.

  Turn a victim’s mind off while he had her body.

  Leave her awake and trapped in her flesh watching helplessly as a means of torture.

  Cause her to participate in the act.

  Make her enjoy it.

  Bring her to dependence on it.

  Truly, the potential was frightening.

  You have another power, Daniel, she told him and watched the man’s mind blink in surprise.

  What? he asked.

  Kathra smiled.

  With but a touch, you could induce a woman to experience the greatest orgasms she has ever imagined possible, my little Warrior-Chef, she teased him lightly. Remember that, as well.

  The blink of surprise he pulsed back at her was tinged with newly-awakened possibility. And a depth of surprise greater than the man stood tall. Especially as the other women snickered and Areen managed to blush so hard she might start a fire.

  Kathra smiled.

  She turned her attention to Ugonna now. Ripped open the woman’s mind for the others to see. Saw the jealousy. The anger. The betrayal of what Ugonna considered hers by fiat taken away from her.

  That’s not how comitatus works, traitor! Erin snarled across the mental gap. You earn it. You earn the right to keep it.

  Kathra nodded with the words. She turned to each of her women’s minds to make sure they carried this memory with them.

  And the possibility that Daniel could be a power for good with a little help, and not just the Left Hand of Evil.

  Daniel, I must do a thing, Kathra pulsed back at the man. It may be your power, but it is my will, if you allow it.

  I serve, Commander, he grinned tightly and paused for a fierce moment. And I cook.

  Kathra Omezi, Commander of the Mbaysey, reached out a hand and grabbed all of Ugonna’s mind inside it.

  She could do this thing, and it was her responsibility to own. The others were merely witnesses whose testimony would not be questioned.

  She crushed Ugonna’s ego in her hand and willed the woman to simply die.

  Across the room, a body collapsed to the deck bonelessly.

  Kathra let go of herself and Daniel as an entity and stepped back into her own body.

  Seven of them fell into an awkward silence.

  “Now what?” Daniel asked in a tiny voice.

  “Now we must go rescue your turtle, Daniel,” Kathra said. “Before the Sept take it.”

  38

  Ndidi understood that it was necessary for her to only be a helpful assistant today, rather than the person in charge. Daniel needed to cook this meal, as even in his own mind he saw it as a Last Supper kind of thing, reaching back to the old religions he had known as a child and still used to flavor his idioms when they weren’t food related.

  She could see the stress taking a toll on the man, even as his hands never made a false move. Spiced chicken in Spanish rice with refried beans covered in cheese. Drop biscuits with jam. Not quite the extremes of comfort food, but Ndidi knew that this was one of those easy-to-make meals that would bring him some level of solace and calm while everyone waited to find out if the Sept had made it there ahead of them with their trap.

  Ndidi did make him eat when they put out the trays of food, dragging him by one hand to a spot at the middle table where the rest of the comitatus seemed to crystalize around him when he sat.

  “I can handle things from here,” Ndidi scolded him. “You refuel your strength for what’s coming.”

/>   Daniel grumbled, but did not greatly resist her. Ndidi delivered more food than he probably needed, but that would keep him focused.

  Kathra and her crew surrounded the man and seemed to just generate waves of warmth towards him. Ndidi didn’t really have any other way to describe it.

  She had heard the story from Kam, and it had made its way around the entire crew by now. Ugonna a spy and a traitor, executed by the Commander herself, but not before a message had gotten out to the Sept.

  Thus the race to Azgon.

  The comitatus couldn’t do anything when they got there. Even a patrol force would probably be so large that WinterStar and The Haunt would be overwhelmed if they offered battle. If there was a Septagon, resistance would be so ineffectual that the Sept might not notice.

  The only thing that Kathra could do at that point would be to flee, and perhaps lose the Star Turtle forever. The Sept could not use it, but Ndidi knew that they would not allow another to have it.

  No, only Daniel could act. Kathra was the Commander, and one of the most dangerous people Ndidi knew, so she suspected some level of cunning planning had taken place, but they would not know what their options were until they arrived.

  Ndidi kept coffee topped off and delivered more biscuits to whoever asked. She could see this turning into a permanent job shortly, if they were successful, or she might have to take over for the crew mess, with Ugonna gone.

  Without the turtle, would Daniel stay? Or would its loss break him somehow?

  Ndidi wasn’t sure what it would take to bend the chef. He had shown himself to be the equal of any, save perhaps Kathra, with his will. So unlike a male.

  But they were all in uncharted space now.

  Kathra checked her handheld and looked up at the group.

  “We will arrive in an hour,” she announced in a calm, simple voice. “All Spectres will be ready to launch on emergency notice, but we will not do anything until we know who is there. If they open fire the instant they get a lock on us, WinterStar may be destroyed before we can escape. If battle erupts, you will launch and determine if you should remain or flee. If it is a trap, at least half of you need to make it to Concursion to let the rest of the tribal squadron know the outcome, especially if they need to select a new Commander. Questions?”

  “Have we considered sneaky?” Daniel spoke up, asking her from across the table. “Instead of just attacking?”

  Ndidi grinned at the look of confusion on the Commander’s face.

  Warrior-thinking.

  Sometimes, a chef has to take whatever ingredients she has and spoof them into pretending to be something else, when a customer has a specific desire in mind and kitchen falls short. Daniel had taught her that trick. If you never tell them the truth, they might never know.

  “Can we drop out early?” Daniel asked. “I don’t understand how FTL works, so I have no idea what I’m talking about, but could we land clear out at the end of observation range first?”

  “What good does it do us if they are already there?” Kathra asked. “They’ll detect us and be alert when we do jump close. Here we would have some level of surprise.”

  Ndidi was at the end of the central table, filling coffee with one hand and watching both faces as they talked. Daniel’s smile was the sort of evil thing that brought a bit of warmth to her soul.

  “Do we have to jump close at all?” Daniel grinned. “Perhaps you just toss me out the airlock as you drive by and disappear? I might sneak by even a Septagon, if they are looking for big, metal warbirds and ’Stars.”

  Ndidi grinned with him. Misdirection.

  Chef-thinking.

  “He’s right, you know,” Erin spoke up to a chorus of assents from other women.

  Kathra looked around and took the temperature of the room before nodding.

  “If you are sure, Daniel,” she replied.

  “Sure?” Daniel asked. “Not at all. I might be even crazier than the rest of you. Probably am. Would it even work?”

  “It might,” the Commander said aloud. “And I like the idea, if you are willing to spend that much time alone, assuming trouble is waiting in ambush.”

  “It protects the Mbaysey,” he said. “You can drop me off and immediately head to the Concursion from well outside the range anybody can hurt you. There you pick up the rest of the tribal squadron and flee, knowing that we’ve hopefully eliminated the spy that was telling the Sept where to find you. Eventually, I can catch up, assuming the Sept doesn’t kill me in the process.”

  “Could you stop them?” Erin asked. “Reach out and do something to them?”

  Ndidi watched him shrug with pained ignorance. That had been the one thing that the two of them had talked about when they were alone cooking. He could see the things Urid-Varg had been able to do, but Daniel didn’t have the amplifiers that had been built into the jewelry when Urid-Varg poured his mind into it. Nor the native mental powers that the conqueror had apparently had or developed later.

  “Against a dozen, certainement,” Daniel nodded. “Against perhaps three hundred thousand? No. I presume the issue will fall somewhere in the middle, so maybe. What is the worst thing they could do, kill me?”

  “They could capture you,” one of the other women called out.

  Daniel turned his head to lock eyes with Joane, who had apparently been the one who spoke.

  “No, they could not,” he said in a cold, dark voice that reminded Ndidi of the deep gap between stars and the hungry, angry things legend said to live there. “They could shoot me with one of those big guns, and probably kill me, but if they brought me aboard their ship, I would be in range to do things to them. Terrible things.”

  Ndidi shivered at those words. Daniel had confided his nightmares to her, as Kathra had ordered. Except they both knew that many weren’t nightmares.

  They were memories of things the Conqueror had done to other people. Other planets.

  Entire species.

  More women shivered at Daniel’s tone. Most of them had never heard a male with that level of angry cruelty in his voice. Males weren’t like that, at least not around here. Ndidi had no doubts that in the Sept, some men rose to that level.

  The naupati in command of a Septagon, for instance.

  “I will make some changes, Daniel,” Kathra said, rising from her empty plate. “We know the rough distance the Ram Cannon can hurt us, so we will try to land outside that. You will need to prepare for space.”

  The other women took that as a dismissal as well, and in short order Ndidi and Daniel were the only two in the room.

  “You get ready,” Ndidi said. “I can clean up.”

  “No,” he said, moving to the basin where the women had left their plates and utensils and lifting it to carry into the back. “I’ll start dishes while you pack food. It will take me all of five minutes to get dressed and meet the Commander at the rear airlock.”

  Ndidi nodded, understanding that spending the rest of the time waiting would just eat at his soul and take him to even darker places than he was now. He needed the company more than anything, especially as he was facing the need to walk right up to a Septagon, perhaps, and challenge them to single combat, all by himself.

  So she got leftovers into bins and stowed in the refrigerator, where they would turn into snacks later, and alternatives to whatever she ended up making for dinner. Pasta in red sauce was the current plan, but she had a full cabinet to pick from, once she saw where they were. And dinner would be delayed until after the crisis was over, anyway.

  Daniel returned to his cabin once everything was in the dishwasher and chugging away. Ndidi cleaned up the dining hall from what little mess the women had left, took off her mostly-clean apron.

  She wasn’t dressed in the same general uniform of the comitatus, but loose pants to mid-calf in a sturdy, green cotton denim and a gold shirt that resisted stains and flowed with her. She check her look and glasses in a handy mirror and decided she was presentable enough for now.

  Nd
idi went out and met him in the hallway as the time grew short. He would still need company, right up until the moment of truth. She could do that for him.

  Into the nearest of the six elevators. Up to the hub of WinterStar, where they flew like pretty fish through the air. Aft, the corridors were empty, with everyone either at a damage control station, a weapon turret, or ready to launch their Spectres into combat.

  They met the Commander at the rear airlock. Port side, if there was such a thing in the absence of gravity to provide a down element. Only out on the rim did you get downward pressure, which was why people who worked in the core slept in spin.

  “You are prepared?” Kathra asked as they hung from bars and looked out a nearby portal at lines of stars.

  It was an unnecessary question, as Daniel had changed fully into the bizarre costume he had inherited from Urid-Varg’s last victim.

  Ndidi watched Daniel quickly cycle through the stages of death, lingering on pain and anger perhaps longer than he should, and less than she expected. Finally, he nodded.

  “There is no other way, Commander,” he murmured. “At least none that does not introduce unacceptable risk to the rest of the tribe. I will succeed, and meet you, or I will die, and that will be that. Tomorrow, we will be renegotiating my contract to include hazard pay over and above the normal excitement of a starship kitchen.”

  She watched Daniel’s face break out into as much of a grin as the weight on his soul would allow right now. The Commander shared it with him, and then sobered.

  “Have you not always warned me that the most dangerous job in the galaxy is a professional kitchen?” she teased back. “Tattooed psychopaths with knives, I believe was your phrase.”

  “Oui,” he agreed. “But today it might be Untattooed Xenocides with Axial Megacannons. Perhaps they can become as dangerous as an angry Sous Chef. We shall see.”

  “Good luck,” Kathra sobered. “I will be below, ready to launch, so we can still talk on the comm until you step into space. After that, radio silence must be maintained.”

  “Understood,” Daniel said.

  “I will keep him company here as well, Commander,” Ndidi interjected, meeting the woman’s eye and communicating on a much deeper level.