Victorious Dead (The Asarlaí Wars Book 2)

by Marie Andreas

  “Maybe it doesn’t work for people who have been dead.” Vas knew the fact she could open a secret sealed box could be a bad thing, but it was going to have to wait in line.

  “Maybe—” Deven was cut off as an alarm rang through the ship, followed by a call to general quarters. A call Vas had never made in her life. The alarm cut off but the lights were still flashing.

  “Mac? Gosta? What the hell is going on?” She grabbed a few blasters from her desk, threw one to Deven and kept the other two.

  “It’s Ragkor, Captain. He’s lost it, completely lost it.” Mac sounded more annoyed than worried so Vas put one of her blasters back. She noticed Deven kept the one she gave him.

  “Okay, let’s go see what my other second-in-command is doing.” Vas took the box and the bag she’d carried it in, and unlocked a hidden safe built into the wall. She didn’t keep much in it, but it would hold this artifact once she coded the lock command even if the ship around it blew up.

  The command deck was in chaos, not the ‘we’re all going to die’ chaos, but the ‘what in the hell is going on’ chaos.

  Vas had expected to see Ragkor on the deck, regardless of her command that he stay locked up. But he wasn’t there. He was on the big screen at the aft of the deck.

  “Someone shrink that please,” Vas said and went for her chair. Ragkor’s head the size of a shuttle was something no one needed to see. He also was yelling, but luckily someone had already turned off the volume. She looked up to see his image shrunk to something far more manageable. The picture had pulled back so she could see the decon room she’d left him in—or what was left of it. All of the equipment was shoved around. Nothing appeared to be busted, just seriously, and awkwardly, relocated.

  “Captain, I’ve tried—”

  Vas held up her hand and cut Gosta off. Then she flicked open the comm to the decon room Ragkor was in. “Stand down, soldier. Now.” Vas had never been military, nor would ever be mistaken for such. But she could steal their tactics. Her voice was all pissed-off military commander.

  And it shut Ragkor up mid-yell.

  “Now, calmly, and professionally, explain what the hell you’re doing.”

  “Captain, we’re under attack. You have to destroy him, now!” The way his voice went up on the last word and the white around his eyes was not good.

  “Soldier, if you can’t control yourself, I will control you. Is that understood?” She turned as Terel came up on the deck and waved her to come to her chair. Then shut off the comm to Ragkor. “Opinion, Doctor?”

  “Anyone else I’d say too many rec drugs—but our boy is too clean for that. Yet something is affecting him.”

  “Agreed. Can you tranq the chamber before he hurts himself?”

  “Already done,” Terel smiled and held up a small hand-held. I figured you’d say that, and as he is still recovering from his earlier issues, he’s my problem.”

  Vas looked up. He was yelling again, but he was fighting yawns to do it.

  “It’s a slow tranq, but if you want to ask him anything you better do so now.”

  Vas opened the comm again. “Ragkor, you need to remember who you are and fight to stay calm.”

  “Captain…it’s him…he’s going to destroy everyone.” He slid down into his chair as the tranq hit him, but he tried to keep his eyes open.

  “Who, Ragkor?”

  “Deven. He’s not what you think.” He tumbled forward at that point.

  36

  V as looked to Deven as a pair of armed guards stormed Ragkor’s room. Both were big and both had full contamination suits on. A mobile, sealed bio-bed drifted behind them.

  “Be careful what you touch and keep him secured in the bed,” Vas said. “We have no idea what caused him to lose it. I also want to know how in the hell someone confined to a secure decon chamber had access to the alarms.”

  “Pela, prepare a full work up as soon as they bring Ragkor down,” Terel said, then nodded to Vas. “I’ll be down in the med lab. Our own people are keeping me busier than if we were actually fighting someone.”

  The nods from the two guards were enough for Vas, so she cut the comm again but kept the image on the screen, at least until they had managed to haul Ragkor’s unconscious body into the bio-bed. “Gosta, order a team down there to go over that room. Keep everything secure.” That was something that would normally fall to a second-in-command, but considering one second was the cause and the other was the accused, it was better to have someone else. Besides, in the time that Gosta and Flarik had been her seconds, she’d come to rely on them for far more than their original jobs.

  “Do you want to guess at what he was talking about?” Vas asked Deven. They couldn’t ignore it. Her crew had seemed surprised and happy at his return to the living, but they were also suspicious by nature. And everyone on the command deck had heard Ragkor’s last words.

  “Not at all,” Deven said as handed back the extra blaster and leaned up against her chair. “I take it I’m fully cleared for a return to duty?”

  Taking him down planet side had been for two reasons: one to see if he recalled anything from his time there as a gahan that might help them, but also to see how fit he was.

  “I have to say, for a formerly dead second-in-command you held up admirably.”

  There was something behind Ragkor’s accusation, hopefully just paranoia from whatever got in his system combined with his low-level pre-cog skills. Which asked the question of who hit him with a drug and how did they get it to him?

  “Captain, we have a problem,” Mac cut in. He was watching Deven, but there wasn’t any fear or worry there. Vas hoped the rest of the crew would follow suit.

  “Only one?”

  “One relating to us trying to find out where your friend was sending us. The Silantian system is locked down. There is a civil war in the system—not the Silantians themselves however—and no one is going in.”

  Vas had briefly pushed aside their goal to get to Yholine. Hrrru had used his love of puzzles to pinpoint the area in the image that had been focused on in the vid. The planet was mostly abandoned so wherever this civil war was, it wasn’t there. She punched up a map of the system. “Where is the fight?” They could try and wait it out, but the way things had been going lately, that wasn’t the best option.

  “The Hight Collective. They are on the small planet farthest from the system center and the gate.” Gosta switched the screen to show a split. “They just started fighting, but the Silantians are blockading it.”

  “We are mercs, you know,” Deven said quietly.

  “I know that. I hadn’t been taking jobs to keep a low profile, but since our presumed enemies flew right past us, I think we might be able to pick up a job.” She tapped her comm. “Flarik? Any chance you can get us papers to fight in the Hight Collective’s latest exercise in futility? Not full run, just small backup support—tell them we have too many other commitments, but want to help. Whatever will make them happy.”

  The lag in response told Vas that Flarik had probably been doing one of her mini hibernations. Along with becoming social, and becoming friends with Mac of all people, Flarik had also been running experiments as to reduce the amount of time she had to spend in hibernation.

  “Apologies, Captain, I shall look into it. I do believe with our reputation they will manage to find the funding.”

  Vas hadn’t even thought about the money. She needed a chance to get near the former Silantian home world. But not negotiating would blow everything.

  “Thank you, Flarik.” Vas cut the comm then turned back to Gosta, Mac, and Deven. “This is going to have to be real, folks. I will need a crew to go down and fight. Gosta? What’s the tech level they are running right now?” Planets could control their level of tech and carried that over into their battles. A lower level tech world would be sticking with pointy objects. Bringing a blaster to a knife fight was grounds for being immediately banned from all low-tech worlds and any merc job anywhere within the Commonwea
lth. The enforcing agency of the Commonwealth hadn’t been slowed down by the hiatus the rest went through.

  “They are back to primitives: swords, bows and arrows only. A pulse weapon fight decimated most of their higher tech a few years ago. They have also set up parameters for anti-tech.”

  Which meant if you came down with any advanced weapons, they would explode—taking out their users and anyone else close by as well.

  She and Deven were two of the best sword fighters on the ship—but it would be better if they both went to track down whatever Aithnea had left behind. Vas scrolled through her crew listing on her monitor—she’d let Deven set up the actual merc party, they had enough fully trained primitive fighters to send a detachment down to the Hight Collective. Then Vas, Deven, and maybe one or two more could take a shuttle to the battle.

  Terel flagged her comm before she could go further with her thoughts.

  “Captain, I think we have a problem. There was Pericdin dust in Ragkor’s system. I’m flushing it out, but between that and his little spacewalk trick it’s a damn good thing he’s a former Marine—this could have killed a lesser person.”

  Vas rubbed the space between her eyebrows and took a deep breath. “No clue how it got to him?” That was the dust the Rillianian monks had tried to use to take over her ship months ago. It caused hallucinations and brought forth the person’s dominant skills. A shudder went through her—Ragkor was a pre-cog. Was he actually seeing the future? Before his death, she trusted Deven with her entire life. But there were too many clues that this wasn’t her Deven. At least not completely.

  “Air shaft,” Terel said shortly, but she didn’t need to expand. Something in the air shafts could easily bring down the entire ship without a single shot fired.

  “Get yourself in a decon suit, and send anyone you need to take the shafts apart and track it down. Put the ship on maximum screening and lock all shafts to or from any of the decon rooms.” Vas turned to the deck crew. “I need three of you to get into decon suits now. Considering how fast the dust hits, I think we’re fine, but I want protected backup in case this does go south. Mac, you’re the first one in the suit.” Mac had been the indirect cause of the Pericdin dust attack before. He and Jakiin had taken on an unsanctioned smuggling job. As much as he might deserve another round of the crazies, Vas needed her main pilot protected.

  “But, Captain, I can barely move in those,” Mac said as he climbed out of the pilot webbing. The Warrior Wench had two ways to pilot, three if you counted the override at Vas’s chair. But the pilot sling-web was far superior to the console. It had taken him some time to get used to it, but Mac was now a master of the web. The bulky size of the decon suit would mean he’d have to go back to the console.

  “And you’d be unaffected if we are being attacked.”

  “But those suits are horrible. Fine.” Mac hung his head and went to go get a suit. Vas pointed to Deven and Gosta to follow to where the suits were in a small closet. To be honest, as annoying as they were she would put her entire crew in suits if she could, but there weren’t enough.

  “Vas, you need to be in one of these.” Deven came to her and held his suit up. “You are the captain after all.”

  She pushed the suit back to him. “You might not recall all of what happened to you from before, but trust me, none of us ever want you exposed to Pericdin dust again. Ever. You are going in that one.” That was a horrific time. Pericdin was practically designed to take out telepaths. Deven’s two strengths were sex and fighting and both came on full blast. She shuddered at the memory.

  “Get that damn thing on now, before I get people to force it on you.”

  Deven raised his hands up. “I’ll put it on. And, for the record I do recall some of that day. It wasn’t that bad.”

  “Yes it was.” Vas’s response was echoed by everyone on the command deck.

  He shrugged and put on the suit.

  “Captain and Terel, Marwin here. We found a small crack in the vent leading into the decon chamber from the one next door. That one had been where the clothing worn by our crew in the previous attack had been stored until it was destroyed.” He’d taken a hand-held with him and was showing the damaged vent. It didn’t look suspicious and theoretically someone could have missed a tiny bit of it when the garments from their last encounter were brought there.

  Vas shook her head. Question everything. Trust nothing.

  “Good job, Marwin. Now get a team to scrub all of those decon rooms, and continue checking all the vents. Keep everything on lock down and stay in your suits until I say.”

  Vas turned at a thunking noise to find Mac dropping his head to the console. Repeatedly.

  “Mac?”

  “Sorry, Captain. This helmet is too heavy.” But he straightened up and quickly found the ability to stay upright.

  Vas shot Mac one more look to keep him in line, then shared it with Gosta and Deven in case they were getting ideas. Then she stalked back to her chair. “How is Ragkor?”

  “He’s calming down. I did have to sedate him, but it didn’t take him out completely.” Terel dropped her voice. “I believe you might have a second second-in-command lying about his genetic make-up. His card says human, but he’s way tougher than any pure human Marine I’ve ever treated.”

  Vas sighed. She shouldn’t be surprised by any of this anymore. She wasn’t going into everything else he had lied about—at least not now and not on a comm. “Fix him, and keep him quarantined—again—until it’s completely out of his system.”

  “Captain? This is Therlian. Is everything okay? Hallam came here and he thinks the ship is under attack.”

  “Everything is fine. Tell Hallam he can get some tranqs from med officer Pela in the med lab and he should try to get some sleep.”

  There was a slight laugh. “Aye, Captain. I told him the same thing, minus who he needed to talk to about some tranqs. We’ll take care of him.”

  She wasn’t needed on the deck, so Vas went to her ready room, leaving three very annoyed, and still in decon suits, men in charge.

  There were a lot of pieces in play right now, and while it would be nice to think they were unrelated, that was a foolish way to miss something. And Aithnea didn’t raise a fool.

  The attack on the nuns was directly related to her. The gray ships found the nuns and were looking for something—Aithnea refused to tell them whatever it was to protect Vas and her crew. And whatever future action they were supposed to take. Ramoth wasn’t what he’d appeared to be, and had someone with money backing him. There was no way in the seven hells of the planet of Jhalm that he didn’t know what was in that box. Or someone behind him knew. That he was a puppet was definitely an option and fit well with his lack of personality.

  The gray ships and black-clad soldiers. Vas took out a map screen and stylus and marked all the places of known attacks from either. Ninety percent were on the rim or outer worlds. Yet the soldiers had been ruling an inner planet, without anyone outside being aware, for over a year. Now the gray ships were supporting the Commonwealth fighters, stopped what Vas assumed was set up by the soldiers in black, and showed no interest in the Warrior Wench.

  Which looped back to Aithnea destroying herself and all of her people to keep Vas and her ship hidden. From the gray ships. Who no longer appeared to care where Vas or her ship was.

  Vas marched over to the food dispenser and got a bowl of hthi stew and a very large bottle of beer. She kept hard alcohol in her desk. Two flasks in case one ran out. But right now, beer seemed to fit the need better. And at least she was having food with it.

  She’d finished the stew and a second beer when her comm cut in. She’d created a map of all of the current events running rampant in the universe right now, but staring at it for a half hour hadn’t resolved anything.

  “What?” Her terseness was more annoyance at the markings before her, and the damn mystery of that dragon head hiding in her safe, than the disturbance of the comm.

  “Three th
ings: Terel says all the scans show no dust in any of the decon rooms, the vents, or the ship’s passageways,” Bathie said. She must have shown up early for her shift again. “Mac says if he doesn’t get out of that decon suit immediately he’s going to die right on the spot. And Grosslyn from Home called. They actually have the Victorious Dead back together. And want to know what to do with her.”

  It was a good thing Vas had swallowed the last of her beer. She choked on that last part. “How in the hell did they do that so fast? Never mind, I’ll be on deck in a minute.” Vas closed the comm. Yes, she could contact Home from the ready room, but if this wasn’t a drunken prank by Grosslyn back Home, she wanted her deck crew to be involved. She also wanted someone to explain how an entire Galaxy-class ship could be reassembled in less than thirty-six hours.

  She looked at the mess on her desk and almost put it away. Then shrugged and left it there. Maybe something would make more sense later.

  The energy on the deck was far livelier than it had been an hour ago, and Vas knew it wasn’t just because they were closing in on the Silantian system and an actual mercenary job. Their ship might be back. She looked around the deck—really looked around it. This gilded tart had seen this crew through some tough times. She’d been sure when she had first taken this ship, that she’d leave it the second the Victorious Dead was back.

  She was surprised to admit to herself that she no longer felt that way. It was more than just the power and tech this ship had—Vas felt it was part of her now. The way she had felt about the Victorious Dead.

  “Okay, someone tell me what is going on with the Victorious Dead?” She pointed to where Mac was twitching in his suit. “And yes, Mac, Deven, and Gosta, you can dump your suits.” She didn’t mention Terel. As the ranking medical officer, she could decide when that suit came off herself.

  “It’s true, Captain, they got it together, with some special help.” Bathie’s grin told Vas she might not want the answer to the next question.

  “Who helped them?”