Unconcerned, Tony sprang lightly to her feet and grabbed the rifle.
“Val!” Matt shouted, but he already saw it was useless. The engineer was locked in a standoff with his nemesis, quite oblivious to everything else, and he wasn’t about to let go. Ander’s gun clattered to the floor as the two men grappled, so close that neither Matt nor Tony could possibly shoot Ander without risking hitting Val as well. Not that their help would be in any way welcome. It was Val’s fight, and it was a fight to the death.
“Tony, get upstairs, fire up the lifeboat,” Matt ordered. “Get it ready to go as soon as we step through the hatch. I’ll get Val.”
This time, she hesitated, looking uncertainly between them. Val somehow managed to pin Ander to the far wall, but he was struggling to maintain his hold. He was strong, but his injured hand and the beatings he’d sustained were slowing him down.
“Go!” Matt repeated, and Tony ran to the escape ladder. Matt raised his handgun, holding it firmly in two hands. Personal vendetta or no, he was determined to take a shot at Ander as soon as an opportunity presented itself. At that moment, Ander turned, twisting in Val’s grip, and landed a precise punch to Val’s solar plexus that made him grunt and take half a step back. Pressing his sudden advantage, Ander whipped out an electric knife, as sharp and deadly as the glint in his eyes.
“I shoulda killed you when I had the chance,” he spat out, never taking his eyes off Val. “Griggs’s too soft. But you’re not getting away now.”
As if to underscore his words, the bright illumination in the corridor dimmed, and red emergency lights flashed along the bottom of the walls.
“Intruder alert,” a computer voice announced from somewhere overhead. “Intruder alert.”
Griggs’s crew were definitely onto them now, if that somehow wasn’t clear enough already, and it would only be a matter of minutes, if not seconds, until reinforcements arrived. Matt hoped Tony had the right idea and would make her escape if they didn’t get out in time. Ryce’s life hinged on the lifeboat picking him up on Elysium-5. He couldn’t go back to Griggs’s transport vessel, and the aerojet wasn’t built for outer space travel.
Ander lunged at Val then, too quick for Matt to take proper aim. He cursed and ran toward the fighting men, as Val countered and deflected the strike with his injured hand. The blade sliced through his forearm, but it didn’t give him pause. With his other hand, Val reached under the knife and seized Ander’s throat, squeezing so hard his knuckles turned white, relentlessly crushing his foe’s windpipe.
Ander made a choking sound, and his face turned red, his eyes bulging. Matt reached them in time to knock the knife, which Ander still tried to swipe at Val, from his hand. With a savage growl, Val lifted the man a few inches off the floor and hit his head against the wall with a hard bang. His fingers dug into Ander’s throat with crushing force. Thankfully, Matt couldn’t hear the sound of breaking cartilage over the repeating alarm, but Ander’s raspy gasps were bad enough. Finally, his eyelids fluttered and shut, and he sagged like a marionette with its strings cut.
“Val, we need to go,” Matt urged. He didn’t care if Ander was dead or merely unconscious; either way, a crushed trachea meant he would be unable to give chase.
The engineer didn’t respond, still applying pressure to his opponent’s neck. Blood seeped through his sleeve from the fresh knife wound, dripping on the floor as his mangled hand hung uselessly to his side, but he didn’t seem to notice. He scowled ferociously, intent on Ander’s now-purple face to the exclusion of everything else.
“Val!” Matt grabbed him by the shirt and pulled. He could hear loud noises and someone running up the staircase. It was high time for them to haul ass. “Come on!”
His desperate plea seemed to penetrate the angry haze because Val blinked and released his choke hold. Ander’s body folded and crumpled like a broken doll. Matt didn’t bother checking for a pulse; however, on a momentary flash of inspiration, he hunkered down to reach into the man’s pant pocket and fished out his commlink.
“Let’s go!”
Val let him pull him along, and they ran toward the escape ladder. Matt pushed Val forward, following on his heels, and slammed the hatch just as more guards spilled into the corridor below them. He hurriedly turned the bolt, closing it even though he couldn’t actually lock it from outside, and ran toward the starboard lifeboat airlock, which was open and waiting. As soon as he and Val were inside, he shut the outer hatch, leaning against it and breathing heavily.
“Tony, get us out!” he shouted, and nearly fell over as the tiny vessel shuddered and took off at full throttle, speeding away from the immobile yacht.
THE LIFEBOAT WAS slightly bigger than Lady Lisa’s shuttle, but a bit more cramped as well since it was meant as a rescue vessel for a greater number of people. Matt replaced Tony at the control panel, tapping the adapters on his temples to link to the ship’s computer and setting the course to enter Elysium-5 atmosphere. His hands were still shaky with adrenaline, and he took a couple of steadying breaths to calm himself and focus on the task at hand. The lifeboat responded readily, changing trajectory and veering gracefully toward the designated point of entry above the vast equatorial desert.
“What happened to Ander?” Tony asked, taking a seat in the copilot chair.
“He’s dead,” Val said dully. He had lowered himself into the closest passenger seat, hunching over. “I felt his hyoid bone snap.”
Tony threw Matt a quick look, but he only shrugged slightly. He wasn’t at all sure Ander was really dead. Choking the life out of somebody was a lot harder than as portrayed in movies. And the man probably received top-notch medical assistance as soon as the yacht’s crewmen found him in that corridor. But he wasn’t about to say it out loud in front of Val. If he believed his long-time enemy had met his demise, so much the better. Perhaps now he’d be able to find some peace within himself and change his perspective on what life still had to offer. Either way, if the rest of their plan worked as it should, they’d have seen the last of Mr. Ander.
“You’re bleeding!” Tony exclaimed, just noticing Val’s knife wound, and busied herself with finding a first aid kit and tending to the nasty cut. Val voiced no objections, docilely letting her do her thing with disinfecting and bandaging his forearm. Matt suspected he was in a bit of a shock, both physically and emotionally.
With the course set, Matt allowed himself to relax a fraction. He checked the rearview cameras. The Medusa grew smaller and smaller until it was only a tiny speck in the black void. Whatever was happening on that yacht, it seemed they’d refrained from using the remaining functioning lifeboat to chase them—which was a break Matt had counted on.
He still couldn’t quite believe his outrageous plan had worked and they’d made it off unscathed. A single flesh wound and a few bruises were definitely a fair trade-off for getting out alive. But they weren’t in the clear yet. The relative safety of the Freeport station was a long way off, and even if they managed to pick up Ryce and reach it without incident, they’d have to hurry to make sure they were one step ahead of Griggs. They were still running against time, and being unexpectedly waylaid by Ander had set them back quite a bit.
Matt took out his comm. The one he’d snatched from Ander was stashed in his other pocket, but he was content to leave it there for the time being, having turned it off. The race channel had long gone silent, of course; there was no way of knowing what the outcome had been. His earlier anxiety, which had been pushed aside by survival instinct, was back in full force. Tapping on Ryce’s contact, he typed a quick message:
On our way to the rendezvous point. All ok?
He waited, but no answer came. He wasn’t even sure his message had been received. Perhaps there was some technical problem with communications. Or maybe Ryce was simply too distracted or preoccupied to look at his comm. There could be a hundred reasons for him not answering; there was no need to stress about it and jump to long-reaching conclusions.
No matter h
ow he tried to calm himself, it wasn’t working. Matt increased the speed, directing more energy to the thrusters. Come on, come on, come on, he urged, as if he could really compel the ship with the power of his mind.
The lifeboat shook as it entered the planet’s atmosphere, and Matt had to divert his attention to keeping it nice and steady. The ship tore through the dense layer of clouds, coming out on the other side under the glare of the Elysium sun. The sky was an intense indigo blue, which made the sand and the rocks below appear bleached white.
They were right on the spot. The long, wide gash of the canyon sinuated below, marring the otherwise pristine expanse of sand dunes and occasional rock formations. Matt turned on the scanners, searching for abnormal heat patterns on the ground. Ryce was supposed to be waiting for them a little way off, where he wouldn’t be easily spotted, but Matt was worried about discovering the traces of a fresh explosion within the canyon. There’d be no way of knowing who the unfortunate jet had belonged to, of course, but in any case, he didn’t pick up anything on the scanner. It served to settle his nerves a bit; however, his heart rate still refused to return to normal.
He slowed down as the lifeboat descended further, skimming the terrain at a safe altitude that still allowed good visibility. The mouth of the canyon dwindled into the distance, and the desert stretched before them in all its barren glory.
Tony took the second seat again, swiveling to face the window display.
“How is he?” Matt asked, not taking his eyes off the scanner’s data feed at the bottom of the screen.
“A bit shaken. But he’ll be all right.”
In Matt’s experience—and if his recurrent nightmares and memory loss were anything to go by—it took a while to be “all right” again after living through captivity and torture, even for someone as stoic and resilient as Val. But time, they said, healed all wounds, and Val, at least, had his friends to help him through it.
“I’ll get the IMA to surgically reattach his finger,” Tony continued.
“It might have to wait. Our top priority is getting Val off the Freeport as soon as possible. We don’t know what happened to Eddie Ander, and I’m not taking any chances. Hell, if it wasn’t for Lisa, I’d be happy to skedaddle myself.”
The risk of staying on the station with an angry crime boss most likely clamoring for retaliation was perhaps too high. But Matt couldn’t leave his ship to be either taken apart by Griggs or impounded by the authorities. Lisa was as much a part of the family as any of them, and you didn’t abandon family. Not the one that wanted you, anyway.
“What’s there?” Tony pointed to the screen just as Matt picked up something on the scanner. His heart leaped, as if he could actually recognize Ryce’s presence from a string of data. He zoomed in on a large outcrop of jagged rocks and boulders sticking out from the white sand.
Sure enough, there was the outline of an aerojet, which upon closer inspection turned out to be Ryce’s Sparrow, behind one of the larger boulders. Whatever had happened during the race, it meant Ryce had managed to survive it, that his body wasn’t lying somewhere at the bottom of the canyon among the debris of his jet.
Reining in his excitement, Matt carefully lowered the lifeboat, landing on a relatively flat patch of craggy ground and shutting the thrusters off.
“Stay here,” he told Tony just in case. “I’m going outside to meet him.”
She only nodded, but Matt was already heading to the lifeboat entryway. The planet’s environment wasn’t hostile enough to require a full space suit, so he just picked up an oxygen mask from one of the emergency kits, and barely waited for the pressure chamber to lock before opening up the main hatch and stepping out onto the sand.
Chapter Twenty-One
MATT RAN TOWARD the jet, leaving footprints in the gravelly sand. The oxygen mask chafed on his swollen nose, but he hardly noticed the discomfort. The jet’s engine was turned off, and there were no other life signs he could discern, and for one awful moment, Matt was terrified something had gone wrong after all. But then the jet’s hatch opened, and Ryce sprang to the ground. He was wearing his flight suit and a far more elaborate oxygen mask which covered half his face and was vaguely reminiscent of alien armor.
Matt closed the distance between them in two long strides and threw his arms around him, locking him in a powerful embrace with a vigor that made Ryce stagger. Forming a coherent sentence that would make sense of all the jumbled emotions swirling inside him—joy, relief, pride—proved quite a challenge for the current state of his faculties, so he settled for a simple:
“I love you. God, I love you so much.”
Ryce’s arms tightened around him in response. “Had I known this would be your reaction to life-threatening situations, I would have found some sufficiently risky hobby to engage in a long time ago.”
There was amusement in his voice, but he seemed in no hurry to release his hold on Matt.
“Don’t you fucking dare,” Matt breathed. “I think we can safely say we’ve had quite enough close calls to last us a lifetime.”
“True. I love you too,” Ryce added in a much more serious tone.
Matt briefly weighed the dangers of breathing potentially toxic air against the benefits of ripping their masks off and kissing right there and then till they were both dizzy, but he couldn’t contradict his own words regarding those close calls. As much as he wanted to feel the press of Ryce’s smooth lips against his, it would have to wait until they were both safely on the lifeboat.
“I’m just glad you’re okay,” he said. “I was worried there for a while when you didn’t answer my call, I must admit.”
“Sorry about that,” Ryce said. “There must be something in the local atmosphere interfering with transmissions.”
“Fuck this planet sideways. Let’s just go home.”
He couldn’t say where home actually was, but perhaps it was true what they said about it not being a place at all. Maybe it was just a feeling you got when you were surrounded by the people who loved you most.
They broke apart and started toward the ship, hand in hand. The sun continued its climb in the rich blue sky, and it was getting hotter and dryer by the minute. But they’d only made it a few steps when the ground in front of their feet erupted in a barrage of gravel. Both of them stumbled backward, clutching at each other and instinctively ducking.
Several more laser blasts, directed from above, hit the sand around them. The violent bangs shattered the relative silence of the desert, preceding the roar of another aircraft’s engine as it came swooping out of the sky. For a second, Matt was sure Griggs had somehow caught up with them, using the second lifeboat or some other proxy vessel. But when he raised his head, he saw the silhouette of a Waxwing jet, massive at this short distance, outlined against the glare of the sun.
Ryce pulled him behind one of the larger boulders of the outcrop. They crouched in its shadow as the Waxwing soared upward and sideways, preparing for another pass.
“What the fuck!” Matt’s heart felt ready to explode, along with his head. The flow of pure oxygen inside the mask, mixed with yet another surge of adrenaline, was making him slightly dizzy, and he fought to maintain focus. “That’s Stahl’s jet!”
“I know,” Ryce said grimly, following the plane with his eyes.
“This is supposed to be a no-fly natural reserve, not the fucking Sawyer Strait! And since when are racers allowed to install laser guns on their jets?!”
“I hardly think he asked for permission. He must have waited till the race was over to seek out my aircraft and get rid of the competition once it became clear I wasn’t going back to the transport vessel.”
Matt glanced at him. “Why is he so pissed? You won, didn’t you?” he said accusingly.
Ryce actually managed to look sheepish despite the mask. “I did. But it wasn’t as difficult as I’d feared it would be this time. And if you’re worried about me using stims—”
“I worried because they’re dangerous,” Matt
interjected in exasperation.
“Whatever. I didn’t use them. Watch out!”
They ducked, plastering themselves against the stone as the Waxwing dived again, showering the outcrop with a hail of laser shots. Matt threw his arm up to shield his face against the shrapnel of rock chips.
“What is he even doing here?” He had to shout to be heard over the terrible noise.
After all they’d gone through, he refused to believe they were in this situation. It was almost surreal. This part was supposed to easy, but now they were trapped, unarmed, while precious minutes were trickling by. They were supposed to return to the station before Griggs had the chance to intercept them. Now, that possibility was looking less and less solid—provided they’d survive the impromptu aerial attack.
“He missed the transport,” Matt said. “Now he’s stuck on the planet with his damn jet, even if he manages to take us out.”
“The fact that he’s a homicidal egomaniac doesn’t mean he can’t have friends or at least paid associates who would fly a shuttle to his rescue, much like you did,” Ryce reasoned. A sharp piece of stone hit his forehead, and he hissed. A streak of blood welled just beneath his hairline.
“We’ve gotta do something,” Matt said. The Waxwing pulled up again, ready to go on another strafing round. “Right now he’s focusing on us, but if he hits the lifeboat…”
He didn’t have to finish the sentence. Even if everyone survived the attack, damage to the lifeboat meant they’d be effectively marooned, with no means of getting off the planet—and then it would be a gamble on who found them first, Griggs or the Freeport authorities. Neither option was particularly appealing.
Ashore Page 18
