Mercenary Instinct (a science fiction romance)

by Ruby Lionsdrake

  Viktor walked around the clearing again. He spotted one of the “critter” prints Tick had mentioned, a three-clawed mark that was probably right for those raptors. It was heading in the direction of a mountain range ten miles away. With the towering trees all around, it wasn’t visible from the ground, but Viktor had spotted the ridge on the way down. There had been lights over there, too, but his map had promised there was a Buddhist temple in that direction, rather than anything so inimical as an enemy camp. Bandits didn’t usually camp out on mountains with lights blazing so anyone could find them.

  Tick had disappeared into the trees, a few meters away or a few hundred. The thick foliage had already swallowed the illumination from his flashlight, so it was impossible to tell. Maybe he was onto something. If they found footprints, they might trace them back to the source, but it would need to be soon, before the rains started and obliterated everything. The problem was Viktor was more concerned about where the shuttle had gone than where the thieves had come from. Was it already back at some headquarters where his men were being interrogated? Or up on someone’s ship? Or maybe the men had already been dumped, and someone was taking the shuttle away to rip it apart and sell it for pieces on the black market. If this had something to do with stealing the prisoners, maybe the shuttle was heading up to the Albatross right now with a strike team ready to invade his ship.

  Viktor halted, the simmering anger threatening to boil over into hot fury. Why hadn’t he thought of that right away? It was such an obvious possibility.

  He was about to stomp back to the parked shuttles when Tick yelled from the trees. The wind made this voice sound distant, but he was probably within fifty meters. “Got a trail, Cap’n.”

  Viktor pushed through fronds and branches, with thorns clawing at his battle armor. The clearing quickly disappeared from sight, and he had only his ears to rely on to find Tick. It would be easy for someone without equipment or a good sense of direction to become lost out here. Rain spattered on the leaves high overhead. It wasn’t dampening his shoulders yet, but it would start dripping through to the jungle floor soon.

  He stepped around a vine-strangled tree, and Tick’s flashlight beam came into view.

  “Take your time, Cap’n, no rush.” Tick grinned again, his big white teeth flashing in the darkness. They were the same age and had even crossed paths a time or two back on Grenavine, but Tick always seemed twenty years younger. Must be the gum keeping him perky. “These the tracks you were hoping to find?”

  Tick pointed at a clear boot print, many clear boot prints. A trail of them wound back into the jungle, heading in the direction of those the mountains. At least six sets. Most of the prints were facing toward the shuttle clearing, men on their way to the ambush point, but a couple were following the same trail and heading the other way.

  “Didn’t spot ’em closer to the landing sight, ’cause they took to the trees here.” Tick pointed up to the branches, highlighting a couple of snapped branches with his light. “Probably knew someone with my fine tracking skills would be out later, so they didn’t want to walk at the end. Might’ve had some short-range hover packs.”

  “These prints.” Viktor crouched and pointed. “They look like they’re on top of the others—made after. You agree?”

  “Yup, that’s right, Cap’n. You do a fair bit of tracking for a kid who grew up in the gardens.”

  “They made us go out and hunt from time to time.” Viktor didn’t talk much about his time in the fleet, even with the oldest members of the crew, so he didn’t bother mentioning where he’d truly learned to hunt. “So. At least two tracks leaving the landing pad. Not everyone left on the shuttle. I don’t suppose you can tell if these tracks might belong to our men?”

  “Not just from the prints—we haven’t got standard uniform boots, and I haven’t taken a look at Tank’s or Rawling’s treads lately, but let me walk along a spell. Might be able to pick out their gaits. Tank rolls along like he’s on a horse, you know.” Tick headed off, flashlight toward the ground.

  Branches snapped and leaves rattled behind Viktor, announcing Hazel’s arrival. He showed her the tracks.

  “We following them, sir?” She glanced toward Tick’s receded back.

  Good question. Viktor was tempted to hop in one of those shuttles and fly back to the ship on the chance that their stolen one was already heading that way, but that would leave one of his teams stranded down here if his people got in trouble and had to retreat in a rush. Besides, all he had was a hunch so far. And Bravo squadron was back on the ship. It wasn’t as if the Albatross was adrift and waiting for someone to board it and take over. He had known there might be trouble while he was gone, more trouble than a handful of pilots and engineers could be trusted to handle, no matter how capable they were in combat.

  “Yes, but I want to let the ship know first.” Viktor tapped his comm unit. “Garland, any change in status?”

  The wind whistled in his ears, nothing else.

  “I can’t get him, either, sir,” Hazel said after trying her own comm. “They have some weird storms out here that affect the ionosphere. Must be interfering.”

  “So glad we paid for that state-of-the-art communications equipment last year.” Viktor pushed through the damp leaves, rain droplets spattering his armor and face, and headed back to one of the shuttles. Its comm equipment was more powerful. Lightning flashed in the distance, and he winced, the Eytect unit a hair slow in washing out the sudden brightness. He tugged it off and stuffed it into his pocket. All of his equipment was unreliable tonight.

  When he stalked inside the shuttle, Lieutenant Sequoia, his boots up on the console, looked up from an old-fashioned book he was reading. “Problem already, sir? You look grouchy.”

  “That how you guard my shuttle?” Viktor pushed the boots to the side and jabbed the comm.

  “Sound grouchy too.” Sequoia shifted his book to reveal a laser pistol and waved to a hologram displaying the area around the shuttle, presumably demonstrating that he was paying attention to the surroundings. Another Grenavinian, he had been with the company since the beginning, too, and was a good pilot and a reliable man, but he had zero career ambition and even less interest in commanding others, so he wasn’t always the model soldier.

  “If someone steals this shuttle while you’re in it, I’m sending you to remedial pilot school with Commander Thatcher.”

  Sequoia’s face grew pale, and he lowered his boots to the deck. “I... would rather have my pay docked, sir.”

  “Yes, I know.” Viktor jabbed the console again. “Garland, come in. You there?”

  “Here, sir. What’s—” The speaker interrupted him with a crackle and hiss.

  That didn’t sound promising, either, but at least Viktor had gotten through. “Hazel, Tick and I are going to follow some tracks. The rest of the crew is approaching Hood’s hideout. I want you to keep an eye out for our missing shuttle. If it shows up out of the ether, ask some pointed questions and make sure there aren’t any unauthorized visitors on it, do you understand?” Lightning flashed beyond the viewport, and the first spatters of rain landed on the craft’s nose. “Garland?”

  “...breaking up, Captain. I heard that you’re tracking and... about shuttle?”

  Viktor raised his voice, as if that could somehow make his words cut through the storm interference more easily. “If that shuttle shows up, make sure nothing fishy is going on before you let it on board.”

  “...understand, sir. The shuttle... already here.”

  “What?”

  “...a few minutes ago.”

  “Send a team down to check on that, Garland. I want to know what happened. I want a full report.”

  More static answered him. The rain picked up outside.

  “Should I fly up to check on things?” Sequoia asked.

  “No. Not yet. Garland should be able to deal with any problems small enough to fit in a shuttle. If there’s even anything to deal with.” Viktor might have missed half of Ga
rland’s words, but they hadn’t sounded alarmed. Maybe Tank and Rawlings had already resolved their trouble and were reporting back to the ship. Still, why wouldn’t they have come back down to pick up the men they had marooned down here first instead? “Just... don’t let anyone in who’s not supposed to be in.”

  “No, sir, wasn’t planning on it. Especially not given how grouchy this weather is making people.”

  Viktor gave him a flat look and started for the door. He glanced back before leaving and caught Sequoia reaching for his book. Sequoia stopped, smiled innocently, and crossed his hands in his lap over the pistol instead. Viktor returned to the comm for a moment.

  “Commander Thatcher,” he called to the shuttle next door. “Are you there?”

  “Of course, sir,” came the prompt reply.

  “Lieutenant Sequoia is lamenting how little he has to do over here. Would you mind running through some navigational math problems with him? To help him stay alert.”

  Sequoia’s mouth sagged open, an expression of horror forming on his face.

  “Certainly, sir. Given the potential fluctuations in the ionosphere from the coming storm, it would be an apt time to review linear equations useful for navigating magnetic fields. Lieutenant, shall we begin with a discussion of the Lorentz force?”

  Viktor smiled, as much at the enthusiasm in Thatcher’s voice as at the look of betrayal Sequoia launched at him. “Not a good idea to call your captain a grouch,” he said and jogged outside, trusting he wouldn’t find boots on the console again anytime soon.

  Hazel was waiting, stoic in the face of giant raindrops splashing onto the cement landing pad around her. There were already impressive puddles. Viktor was tempted to forget the prints and go help the rest of the team, so the company could complete its core mission more quickly, but the storm would wash those tracks away before long. “We’re going to follow them for a couple of miles, see if we find anything useful, and if not, we’ll cut over and join the others.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Viktor eyed the ever-darkening clouds. He hoped the storm—and the communications—would improve soon, but he wasn’t counting on it.

  Chapter 7

  Zzzzpt.

  The hair on the back of Ankari’s neck stood up, but the force field didn’t flicker, or show any sign of disturbance at all.

  Lauren sighed. “It’s not fair to hire a microbiologist and then expect her to blast her way out of spaceships. I didn’t study that in school.”

  “Technically, I didn’t hire you,” Ankari said. “I offered you a share of the company.”

  “What’s the difference?”

  “You get paid less and you’re expected to do more.”

  “I knew I should have read the fine print on that contract.”

  “But,” Ankari said, lifting her hand into the air grandiosely, “when we get bought out or make an IPO on the galactic stock exchange, you’ll become a very rich woman.” She caught a whiff of her armpit while it was up there next to her nose and grimaced. “I need a shower.” She wondered if Viktor had noticed. He was used to running around with sweaty soldiers. Maybe she had been an improvement, even with her three-days-since-the-last-washing fragrance.

  “A cold one?” Jamie asked. “Because of your need to cool down after your steamy kissing with the captain?” The girl was decidedly intrigued by Ankari’s evening dalliance.

  “No, I’ve recovered from that. I just want to wash myself for hygienic reasons.” And so she would smell better the next time she was entangled with someone. “How’s the research going?” Ankari pointed at the tablet. “Can you fly the shuttle yet?”

  Jamie prodded the display dubiously. “Fly it? I think so. As long as a lot of difficulties don’t come up.”

  “I notice she didn’t say anything about landing it.” Lauren pulled open the side of the compact generator. “Ugh. So many circuits.” Strange that she wasn’t daunted by things with trillions of cells, but a few colored wires could make her cringe.

  “Let me see if I can help.” Jamie scooted onto the floor next to her.

  Ankari grabbed the tablet. She had been tapping her feet, eager for her turn so she could see if Fumio had responded to her mail. When she logged into her account, the lack of new messages made her slump back against the wall. It had been twenty-four hours since she mailed him. She couldn’t believe he hadn’t responded; he never checked out of the virtual world. It was odd that she didn’t have any other messages, either. At the very least, some greedy finance outfit or another usually sent daily offers for lines of credit with exorbitant interest rates for her various businesses.

  Ah, but wait. The messages were starting to trickle in now. That was more lag than usual. Odd.

  She tapped on Fumio’s name, and his face came up. She opted for a text version of the video since the security cameras were presumably still rolling, even if the crew was too busy to have anyone standing guard tonight. She also wasn’t entirely positive she would want the other women to hear the unfiltered news if something catastrophic—even more catastrophic than their current situation—was on the horizon.

  Ankari, sweet cakes, it’s good to hear from you, Fumio’s message read, but you’re right: you’re in an alarming predicament. Felgard placed a bounty on you and your business partners two weeks ago, a legal one, not just a sub rosa version for the entrepreneurial criminal element. You’re lucky the police didn’t stop you and arrest you in some port along the way. Or maybe you’ve been off the grid. You certainly haven’t mailed me in ages, and you know how interesting I am to talk to. Regardless, the story that he’s offering is that you and your colleagues broke into one of his electronics facilities, stole information from the data banks, and killed his favorite guard on the way out. Or maybe it was his favorite dog. I don’t remember. There’s a rule about wanted posters being rushed through the channels when someone gets murdered. I, of course, know this is all a lie because he didn’t have any video or any concrete evidence—there’s some doctored-up stuff, but anyone with more than three brain cells could see through it. Also, the last I heard, electronics weren’t anything you were interested in. Nor, pardon my assumptions, could I see you successfully breaking into a top-security electronics lab.

  Ankari was shaking her head as she read, confused by the whole story. It seemed so random. If Jamie and Lauren hadn’t been listed on the bounty as well—her company was mentioned by name, too—she would have assumed some other Ankari Markovich had crossed the lord’s path.

  But Felgard, being a lord of finance, doesn’t need to produce the sort of evidence mere mortals do to get the law to issue warrants for arrest. Up until two days ago, there was a one hundred thousand aurum reward for your capture. You and your cohorts are wanted alive, if you didn’t already know. That recently went up to two hundred thousand, and there’s a note here about you being held by the Mandrake Company. Mercenaries, but I guess you already know that. I looked them up, and they’re a scary group, especially the captain. Ex-Crimson Ops. Be careful out there. It’s not clear why Felgard increased the reward, if you’ve already been captured by someone, and all I can assume is that Mandrake Company decided it wasn’t going to give you up or tried to get more money out of the lord. I don’t fully know how things work in that world, but it sounds like Felgard has, in listing your captors, given the system an open invitation to pay a visit and try to steal you out from the mercenaries. Either way, I hope you’re safe. If you escape them and need help, I can meet you on Orion Prime. Do you need me to? Let me know. I already tried to hack into the net and get the wanted poster removed, but because it’s going through the government system, it’s particularly well protected. I’ll keep working on it, but I think you’re going to have to see Felgard and work things out with him. Standing by, Fumio.

  Ankari didn’t know what stunned her more: that someone was willing to pay two hundred thousand aurums to have her—her, Jamie, and Lauren—delivered to his door or that the captain hadn’t been willing to give
her up. Of course, that was just Fumio’s speculation. Maybe Viktor simply hadn’t liked the terms he’d gotten from Felgard when they had spoken.

  “So... interesting news,” she said. Maybe she shouldn’t say anything. Would this worry the others unnecessarily? Maybe, but they had a right to know.

  “You downloaded a program for opening cell doors?” Jamie asked.

  “No. Is there such a thing?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “The bounty on our heads has been increased to two hundred thousand,” Ankari said. “And everyone in the system knows where we are.” She waved to indicate the mercenary ship.

  “What?” Lauren stared at her.

  “Why?” Jamie added.

  “We’re going to have to take that up with Felgard. He really wants us. All of us. It must be related to our business, but I’m perplexed since we haven’t done trials on anything more interesting than mice yet.”

  “Yes, but those mice had some amazing results,” Lauren said. “Anyone who read the paper I published last month would have seen the potential.”

  “That’s the one you told me about that was printed in Specialized Gastroenterology Quarterly, right?” Ankari asked. “The peer-reviewed journal that three people read?” She supposed it was possible that Felgard was a subscriber, but it seemed unlikely for someone outside of academia to keep up with such publications. Of course, journalists occasionally scanned them for news stories.

  “Yes,” Lauren said, “and it’s more like three hundred people, thank you.”

  “What was the name of the article?”

  “Increasing Genetic Potential, Health, and Longevity Through Ancient Alien Microbiota Transplants.”

  That was less obscure than a lot of the titles of articles Lauren had published. Ankari could see it catching a reporter’s eye. Anything to do with the long-dead aliens was always a hit with the popular press. She plugged the title and author name into the news searcher and waited, drumming her fingers on the side of the tablet. Why was there so much lag tonight?