Deuces Wild Boxed Set: Books 1-4: Beyond the Frontiers, Rampage, Labyrinth, Birthright

by Ell Leigh Clarke

  “Have you ever met a smart virus before?” Hirotoshi asked.

  The Torcellan shook his head, looking terrified.

  “This will activate in thirty-six hours unless we come back to the station and give you the antidote,” Hirotoshi explained.

  He noticed Ryu and Tabitha peering back at him. “So if you did not give us the correct information and we are walking into a trap, now would be the time to tell us. Otherwise, you will die when we do not return.”

  “It was correct!” the Torcellan blubbered, looking from Hirotoshi to Ryu to Tabitha, then at his arm. “It was, I swear! No trap! I spoke honestly!”

  “Good.” Hirotoshi smiled. “That’s good. We’ll see you soon, then.” He stood, pocketed the syringe, and left with Ryu and Tabitha.

  They made it to the main plaza before Ryu broke.

  “Where did you get a smart virus? I didn’t know that was a—”

  “It was vitamin B,” Hirotoshi explained. He gave a sharp smile. “It does absolutely nothing to Torcellans—or most other species, for that matter. I carry it purely for persuasive reasons.”

  Ryu and Tabitha exchanged shocked glances before they both started laughing.

  “He’s a stone-cold bastard,” Tabitha remarked in appreciation.

  “He makes good use of technology,” Ryu agreed. “It’s one of the good things about him. Always willing to adapt to his circumstances.”

  Hirotoshi only looked forward.

  They returned to the ship to find Jun and Kouki just finishing up their push-ups. Jun gave Tabitha an annoyed look.

  “You disappointed me. I bet on you to get into a fight first.”

  “I won,” Katsu gloated, with a smooth smile. He nodded to Hirotoshi. “My compliments on your successful brawl.”

  Hirotoshi tried to look disapproving, but his lips were twitching when he went to the bridge to lay in coordinates.

  The journey, such as it was, was quick, although there was time for Tabitha to throw her pants in the wash and then decide to throw them out anyway, while the team pored over the extra information the Torcellan had provided.

  He must have had a voice-activated communication device. There were a few leads and some assorted tidbits about the captains of the two Skaine ships that had previously docked at Farha Station.

  “He’s really trying to get on our good side, huh?” Jun asked. He was adjusting his armor. They had set down near the volcano, cloaked, and were just waiting for Tabitha to finish showering.

  “He is.” Hirotoshi surveyed one of the recent messages. “But I really don’t care about the captain’s sexual habits. We don’t want to blackmail him, we want to kill him.”

  “You never know when it could be useful,” Kouki countered.

  “When what could be useful?” Tabitha came into the conference room, her hair still drying from her third shower. She caught sight of the message, and her eyes went wide. “That’s not what I think it is, right? Oh, my God, it’s even worse. How does that fit there? No, don’t tell me. I don’t want to know.”

  “Mmm.” Hirotoshi nodded at her and brought up the screen. “As you see, the two ships are present, and a third appears to be very close. We stand ready to move, but there is a complication.”

  “Three ships full of Skaines with slaves in the middle of everything is more than we should try to handle on our own,” Ryu explained, taking up the narrative. “We have no idea what self-destruct devices they might have, and what weaponry their ships have.”

  “What would you like to do, Kemosabe?” Hirotoshi asked. A moment later, he turned to look at her. “Kemosabe?”

  But Tabitha was no longer in the room, and a moment later, an automated alert told them that Tabitha had opened the main hatch of the ship.

  Hirotoshi switched on his comm, his face taut with worry. “Tabitha—”

  “I am going to kill every one of them,” Tabitha told them, her voice shaking, “with my bare hands if I have to.”

  Chapter 9

  Tabitha

  Farha Station

  “You were supposed to be watching her!” Hirotoshi hissed at Ryu.

  “Me?” Ryu rolled his eyes. “You’re Number One. You were supposed to be watching her!”

  “I don’t want to interrupt,” Jun interjected calmly from the edge of the room, a finger pointing to the screen. “But she has somehow managed to lock us all in here.”

  Ryu and Hirotoshi looked around at once, and Ryu swore under his breath.

  “How the hell did she do that?” Hirotoshi strode to the door and banged on it. “Maybe she’s still on the ship.”

  “No, I’m not,” Tabitha’s voice came back. “You all stay there. I am going to fuck some Skaines up.”

  “Kemosabe, there are three ships full of Skaines.” Hirotoshi was struggling to keep his voice level. “Let us help.”

  Tabitha considered for a moment. “Nope,” she replied finally. “I’ll be back in a bit. Stay there.”

  “Like hell,” Ryu muttered. He beckoned Katsu to the door and stood aside as the vampire began tapping the keypad, trying to hack their way out of the room.

  Since Tabitha was apparently listening, they decided to mime the rest of their plans. Jun made gestures to show that he would stay with the ship and come rescue them if they needed it.

  Hirotoshi gestured to himself, Kouki, and Ryu to say that they would go fight with Tabitha, and Katsu tapped himself on the chest to say that he would go too. Hirotoshi shook his head, and Katsu made a series of gestures that seemed to indicate the three warships.

  Hirotoshi threw his hands up, seeming to accede. Kouki just watched.

  Ryu, meanwhile, appeared to have started a game of charades with Jun.

  At the keypad, Katsu kept tapping away. He was close to undoing what Tabitha had done, but the problem was that she always seemed to come at her programming a bit sideways—and with a mischievous sense of humor—and he couldn’t be sure he wasn’t just coding his way into a trap.

  Outside the ship, Tabitha made her way across the ground with a few looks up at the volcano. So far it was only spewing billowing clouds of smoke, but who knew when that might change?

  She’d give a lot to see a big chunk of flaming rock take out a Skaine slaver. Splat! She grinned to herself as she made her way through the greenery.

  She was careful not to touch any of the plants if she could avoid it. They looked a lot like various tropical plants on Earth, some with broad and vibrantly-colored leaves, others with rough bark, and she had learned the hard way during her travels that pretty things could be very, very dangerous.

  Why, just a few weeks ago, some poor petty officer on a routine mission had decided to touch what looked like a nice, soft plant leaf.

  He’d wound up in the medical bay, hacking purple stuff out of his lungs until the Pod-doc had managed to fix it.

  Their cloaked ship was around the side of the volcano from the rendezvous point. Tabitha, moving quickly, managed to get to a vantage point partway up one of the slopes as soon as she saw the three ships.

  The ships had set down on the beach next to the volcano. They were still warmed up, almost as if everyone was ready to escape, and that gave Tabitha an idea.

  “Hsst!” The sound carried to her ears, but barely. Tabitha looked around, frowning.

  Fuck!

  Ryu, Kouki, and Hirotoshi had managed to get out of the conference room somehow. She noticed another figure.

  Was that Katsu as well? Dammit.

  “Bad Tontos,” she muttered to herself as she started back down the slope. “Bad, bad Tontos. Very bad. A thousand push-ups for everyone,” she whispered.

  She didn't intend to let them do this the “reasonable” way or the “smart” way, either. She wanted to punch a lot of Skaines in the face very hard until their heads exploded.

  She wanted the Skaines to be very sorry for what they had done…and then she was going to kill them.

  But first, she was going to have a little fun. After a
ll, three ships full of Skaines was a bit beyond even her abilities.

  A soft “Tabitha!” came from behind her somewhere.

  Ignoring the call, she strode onto the beach with her coat pushed back and her Jean Dukes clearly visible, and the Skaines looked around, hands going instantly to their weapons, eyes darting to one another suspiciously.

  Good. This was going to be easier than she’d thought.

  “‘Sup, Blinky?” Tabitha asked the first captain, who kept blinking nervously. His eyes were even more bulbous than the usual specimen’s. She looked at the other two, one with very blue skin. “Blue. Beans.”

  “’Beans?’” the third one asked.

  “I needed something with a B.” She pulled out one of her Jean Dukes and smiled. “Doesn’t matter much. You see, Blinky here turned you two in.”

  “What?” The one she called Beans whipped around to glare at Blinky. “You turned us in, you snake?”

  “I didn’t!” Blinky pointed at Tabitha, his fingers shaking. “I swear I didn’t! She’s lying.”

  “Snitches get stitches,” Tabitha offered with a shrug before Beans and Blue could begin to believe him. “I told you I was going to interrupt the trade. Didn’t you think you were going to have to deal with some of the mess?”

  Beans and Blue looked at Tabitha, trying to figure out if she was telling the truth. Meanwhile, there was a rustle in the greenery, and Hirotoshi and the others joined her.

  “Good, you’re here.” Tabitha smiled at Hirotoshi, ignoring his stony expression. “Start rounding these bastards up.” She pitched her voice a little higher, gesturing vaguely toward the ships with her head.

  Dammit, I’m going to have to admit to Achronyx that his help would have been appreciated right now.

  She called, “You can let Blinky’s crew off the hook, given that he’s the one who snitched.”

  “Hey!” One of the Skaine crew members looked furious. “We get rounded up and they get to go free, just because Vel’un snitched?”

  Vel’un. Tabitha filed the name away and shrugged, her face the very picture of innocence. “That’s how snitching works, kids. If they survive this mess, they get all the rewards.”

  Vel’un’s crew were looking at one another furtively. They weren’t sure who Tabitha was, but given the fact that they’d all been nervous about this deal, they were beginning to think maybe she should kill everyone else and spare them—and they weren’t about to mess with that by saying they didn’t deserve it.

  “Oh, hell no!” One of the Skaines on another crew rushed at them before they could get their weapons up, and after a few shocked moments the rest of the crews piled on.

  “See?” Tabitha called to Hirotoshi.

  He glared at her.

  Then something like a rocket-propelled grenade soared out of the middle of the fight and headed right toward Tabitha.

  “Fucksticks!” Tabitha’s eyes got large before she dove sideways.

  “Get the captains!” Ryu yelled, and the Tontos charged.

  Tabitha laughed hysterically as she launched herself into action.

  Near the three ships that were arranged in a semicircle on the beach, there were crates of what she could only assume were drugs and various weapons. Some of the Skaines were running for the crates, either to protect the contents or to use them against their enemies—she wasn’t sure which.

  But there was also a pen of slaves all chained together, and some of the crew were running for them.

  There was no good reason for that. Tabitha circled around the main brawl at a sprint and plunged headlong into the back of the group going for the slaves.

  She grabbed one particularly ugly Skaine by the arm and swung him around. “Lights out, motherfucker. Don’t. Trade. Slaves.” She punched him twice in the face so hard his nose shattered under her hand.

  Two more had noticed her and they swung around, rocks shooting from under their boots as they slid, grabbing for their weapons.

  “Too slow!” Tabitha whipped her Jean Dukes up and shot the first, his chest exploding in gore, but the second was directly between her and the slaves. She charged him, dodging one hasty snap-shot before she got close enough and kneed him between the legs. Then she lashed out and heel-struck him in the temple. He went down and didn’t get up again, and she wrenched the gun out of his hands.

  She used the gun’s stock to bludgeon a few more. After using Jean Dukes’ creations, there was no way she was going to shoot a subpar gun unless there was really no other option.

  Besides, it was always funny to see their faces when she hit them with a gun.

  “Don’t! Trade! Slaves!” Tabitha yelled as she whipped the gun around and hit one of the Skaines so hard the whole thing bent. He shrieked in pain, and she hauled him up by the neck. “I will find all of you,” she promised, her eyes now glowing red, “and I will kill every single one of you slave-trading bastards!”

  “I thought you were going to let us live?” one of them blubbered.

  So Vel’un was the one trading slaves, then. Tabitha shrugged and pulled out her Jean Dukes again. “Shouldn’t listen to Ranger Two unless I promise,” she admitted simply and shot him in the face. To the slaves, she added, “Sit tight. I’ll have you out of there in just a moment.”

  “You’re not taking our merchandise!” one of the Skaines behind her yelled.

  Tabitha turned to him, her teeth lengthening and her eyes flashing red. “That was a mistake, cupcake. People aren’t merchandise.”

  Looking around, he seemed to recognize his mistake, and backed away, gulping.

  His friends had his back, though. They all stuck close to him, and a few had the sense to raise their weapons. Tabitha threw back her head and laughed and charged into their midst with a battle cry, grabbing a rifle from one and swinging it at anyone and everyone she could reach. Pulling up, she realized she had bent it on someone’s head.

  “Piece of crap,” she spat.

  “Someone should go check on her!” Katsu yelled from the other side of the battlefield. His sword was coated in blood, and he was grinning savagely as he cut up under an opponent’s ribs. The Skaine’s scream quickly turned into a gurgle.

  “Yes,” Ryu agreed. “Someone!” He slid into a deep crouch, using his forward foot to trip an enemy who was making for Katsu. A knife made short work of the fallen alien and he stood up, pivoting on his left foot to slam into an opponent with his right.

  The Skaine went over with a wheeze. “But I’m a little busy,” Ryu finished. “Hirotoshi?”

  “You’re not the only one who’s busy.” Hirotoshi’s voice was clipped. His sword flashed in three fast downward strokes, and three Skaines fell. Two screams sounded, and a third’s head bounced gently across the sand.

  “Anyone want to play volleyball after this?” Ryu asked, watching the head bounce away before splattering against a large rock.

  Hirotoshi was trying not to smile. “Perhaps we should deal with the fifty or so angry Skaines we still have left.”

  “Indeed.” Ryu matched his tone mockingly. He pulled his sword and turned to face one of the Skaines who had been trying to sneak up on him. “Hello. You’re about to die.”

  In the midst of the Skaine brawl, Vel’un was repeatedly screaming that he had not turned the other two captains in.

  Dammit, who was this strange alien who had just shown up out of nowhere? She had come to the worst meeting, as far as he was concerned. He had just gotten Klik’ad and Droze to accept that he was worth trading with, and the first deal went wrong?

  It was some weird twist of fate, and he hated it. He was a good, honest trader. He never shorted his buyers, and his slaves were good quality, all taken from reasonable colonies with good nutrition. He never passed off weak, near-dead inventory like some of his people did.

  What had he ever done to deserve this? Nothing.

  When he came face to face with one of the humans, he shrieked in fury.

  “Whoever you are, leave me alone!” He stompe
d his foot.

  “No,” the human replied instantly. It didn’t seem at all inclined to bargain with him. “You are a slave trader, and you will be judged as one.”

  “Judged?” What the hell did that mean? Vel’un wondered. “I haven’t cheated anyone! They can tell you my prices are fair.”

  “You are being judged,” Hirotoshi told him, “for trading slaves at all. It is an abhorrent practice that our Empress forbids.”

  “Your Empress…” Vel’un could barely speak, he was so shocked and angry. They were beyond the borders of the Etheric Empire! How could that bitch hope to enforce laws out here?

  Then he looked at the humans and realized that they were the way she was hoping to enforce laws.

  “Skaines!” He raised his voice. “Skaines, stop fighting each other! Fight the humans!”

  “Stop yelling,” Hirotoshi told him. He reached out and dragged the Skaine close, putting handcuffs on him and throwing him away from the battle. “When this is over, if you have survived, you will be judged.”

  “This isn’t legal!” Vel’un yelled.

  “In many cases, there is a difference between what is legal and what is right.” Hirotoshi looked at him gravely. “We do not accept your laws.”

  He slid into action once more, dragging individuals away from the brawl between the ships’ crews and cutting their throats with his knives or breaking their necks. He did not use his sword for this. He would use that only in combat, where his opponent could attack, facing him. Something in him still did not like picking opponents off one by one.

  It felt dishonest.

  With the odds so stacked against them, however, and their opponents holding the slaves hostage, he would not let minor points of etiquette hold him back from doing what was right.

  Vel’un was still yelling for the Skaines to stop fighting one another and start fighting the humans, however, and some of them were taking notice. Fistfights between the crews began to clear up, however grudgingly, and the Skaines turned to face the Tontos and Tabitha.