Lance frowned, trying to recall who had been sent to the outer space equivalent of the Wild West. “Reinforcements. Bethany Anne and Michael sent the ‘older’ kids to cut their teeth on your watch, huh?” He chortled at Akio’s pained nod. “Determined bunch, those four.”
“Six,” Akio corrected. “You are forgetting the cats.”
Lance’s amusement increased. “You remember the old saying? ‘Never work with children or animals?’”
“I’m living it.” Akio groaned. “They have all the training and none of the discipline. I can already see it’s going to be like herding hurricanes.”
“I thought you sounded a little bit too happy about the prospect of rummaging through the minds of everyone here,” Lance commented as he set off toward the tunnel entrance at the back of the cave.
Akio told Lance about Bethany Anne’s ideas for him to establish a Ranger outpost while reining in the more destructive tendencies of Sabine's group. “Hirotoshi and Ryu did nothing but laugh and tell me I have it easy compared to what they went through during their time mentoring Tabitha. I don’t ever recall Tabitha’s enduring solution to crime being, ‘Nuke ‘em all and let their gods sort them out.’”
Lance shook his head as he chuckled. “I don’t envy you, my friend.”
They made their way through the tunnel leading to Lance’s personal quarters, emerging from the secret entrance in the bathroom closet.
Lance showed Akio to a small room that just about held the bed and the desk squeezed in at the end of it. “Sorry it’s not much, but checking you into one of the diplomatic suites would be the fastest way to blow your cover.”
Akio glanced around the room and shrugged before dropping his bag on the bed. “I’ve stayed in worse. What’s the plan?”
Lance leaned against the doorframe. “I’ve been thinking about who benefits from destabilizing Bethany Anne’s efforts to extend the Interdiction. After Harkkat’s scheme backfired, I'd hate to imagine any of the likely suspects would be foolish enough to try to profit from the situation.”
Akio smiled. “I take it you went ahead and imagined it just the same.”
Lance nodded. “Hell yeah, I did. I’ve arranged an early morning meeting with the council. I want you there to make sure everyone is as on board as they say they are, but I don’t expect to find out one of the delegates is the traitor.”
Akio nodded. “I will do a thorough search of everyone in the building without being noticed by anyone. You have Meredith take care of the cameras, and no one will be any the wiser.”
Lance looked at Akio skeptically. “How are you going to get around without being seen?”
Akio lay back on the bed with his hands folded beneath his head and closed his eyes. “Strange are the ways of a multiple-centuries-old vampire, young padawan.”
“Who are you, and what did you do with Akio?”
Lance left after not getting a rise out of the man.
Onyx Station, Bad Company HQ
Sergeant Mara Wilson stayed off to the side of the locker room, taking her time to dry and braid her hair while the people under her command got ready to make the most of the night’s liberty they’d been given prior to their enhancement the next day.
The unit’s nerves had crept up while they waited for their slot on the schedule to come up, and she’d pleaded the case for liberty successfully with their CO.
K'roc, her trusted Yollin corporal, paused by the mirror. “You’re sticking around for the party, right, Sarge?”
Mara gave her a surprised look. “Well, I’m not here to fuck spiders. If there’s not a keg with my name on it, I’m not going to be happy.”
K'roc laughed. “Just checking. We’re about ready to roll.”
Mara went over to her locker and grabbed her jacket. “What are we waiting for? Let’s go and drink All Guns Blazing dry!”
She called her people in for a warning on the concourse outside the AGB entrance. “Have fun, but don’t make dicks of yourselves. I won’t be springing any of you from the brig if you piss security off.” She grinned and waved them inside as they promised to be on their best behavior.
They weren’t the only unit celebrating. The main room of the bar was packed with FDG soldiers intent on letting off some steam before their scheduled enhancement. Mara headed for the bar, pausing to exchange a brief word here and there with people she knew.
“What can I get you?” the bartender asked with a smile.
Mara stretched her hands wide. “The strongest drink an unenhanced human can consume without dying. This is the last night I can be affected by alcohol, and I’m planning on making the most of it.”
The bartender laughed and turned to make her drink. “I’m hearing a lot of that since the Queen got here.” He placed a tall glass of blue liquid swirling around red crushed ice in front of Mara and waved her wrist-holo away when she went to pay. “FDG is drinking on the house. Everyone from All Guns Blazing thanks you for your service.”
Mara accepted the cocktail with a smile. “You can’t say anything better than that! Cheers.”
She took a sip through the straw and winced as she swallowed the inferno that hit her throat. “Well, fuck me sideways.”
The bartender laughed as he put another glass on the bar for K'roc. “Enjoy your evening, ladies.”
K’roc raised her glass to him and followed Mara through the crowd. They found the unit deep in conversation at three tables pushed together in the back of the room. “What’s cracking?” Mara asked, grabbing a chair at the center table.
“Not going to lie,” Barlow Vries admitted, playing with her glass. “There are some serious downsides to the upgrade.”
Mara knew they were all thinking along similar lines, airing their last-minute doubts. “You don’t have to get the upgrade,” she told them all. “No one would think less of any of you if you chose to stay behind.”
“Knowing that I gave up on my duty because I didn’t want to have a shitty sex life?” Barlow growled. “No thanks, Sarge.”
“Reduced sensitivity isn’t necessarily a bad thing,” one of the guys called.
Barlow threw a handful of nuts at him. “It doesn’t matter if you can go for more than a minute, Decker. You’ll still have to persuade a woman to let your nasty ass touch her.”
“Which won’t be a problem when we return as war heroes,” Decker shot back with an obscene gesture. “I’ll be neck-deep in grateful females, and who am I to turn them away? It’ll practically be my duty.”
He ducked when he was pelted with bar snacks by everyone at the table.
“It’s not even a question of what we’re giving up,” Axel stated.
Everyone turned to look at the logistics specialist, a man of few words who nevertheless did his job with precision.
Axel drained his glass and put it down, his expression pensive. “We have the opportunity to be part of the largest military operation in the history of any Federation species. My grandparents left the US Navy and came to space because they believed in Bethany Anne. My parents served in the FDG, and I do the same because I believe in fighting for what’s right. So what if our junk has to take a hiatus? It’s not the worst sacrifice that’s been made to save lives.”
He paused, then grinned. “Besides, nothing’s going to change the fact that Decker’s going to die a virgin, even if he goes in his sleep at the ripe old age of ninety.”
Men, women, and aliens cracked up.
Mara's bladder got the better of her as the subject turned to the Ookens. She returned from the bathroom to find everyone getting ready to leave.
“What’s going on?” she asked.
K'roc showed her a napkin sketch of a blob with tentacles inside a red circle with a line through it. “The team has it in mind to get tattoos to commemorate the mission,” she informed Mara. “There’s a place on Level Thirteen where they’ll tattoo anyone.”
The team paused to see if she would veto the plan.
It could have been the alcoh
ol, but Mara didn’t. She slung an arm around Barlow and flashed a grin at her team. “Level Thirteen it is.”
Chapter Twelve
Onyx Station, Bad Company HQ
Alexis packed her go-bag, annoyed that they were still waiting for the cult cell to do anything other than drift seemingly aimlessly through the system they’d left them in. “They’re going to have to resupply at some point. Maybe we’ll get lucky.”
Gabriel felt her pain. Two weeks of rotating with Christina and Kai to keep tight surveillance on the cultists’ ship had gotten them precisely nowhere. “We only have two weeks left before we move on to the Torcellan quadrant. If we don’t get a result in the next few days, we’ll have to ask Mom what her orders are.”
He shouldered his bag and followed Alexis to the roamer they’d brought from the Gemini. “Do you think she’ll have us stay behind and keep watching? Surveillance blows goats, especially for Christina and Kai in that Pod.”
Alexis dropped her bag on the back seat and got into the roamer before answering. “I think I’d rather push the cell into acting so there’s no chance we get left here when the tour moves on.” She activated the comm on the dashboard. “Take us back to the ship, Gemini. It’s time to head out.”
The twins got to the prearranged meeting place in the asteroid belt between Nabraxia and the neighboring system and had Gemini send out a ping to let Christina and Kai know they were there.
Their Pod nosed out shortly after and zipped into the Gemini’s open transport hold. Alexis made her way to the airlock, wondering how they’d managed yet another stint in the transport Pod with limited space and amenities.
Christina was first through when the airlock cycled open. “I’ll speak to you after I’ve taken a shower,” she told Alexis. “Three days on that tin can, and I don’t want to talk about the air filtration system acting up.”
Alexis gestured in the direction of her quarters. “Use mine. Second door on the left. I have plenty of clothes in the closet, so help yourself.”
Kai shrugged as Christina marched away from them at speed. “You bring any food that isn’t a nutritional substitute?”
Alexis gave him directions to the galley. “We need to find you two a ship. The Pod is fine for a quick journey, but it’s not designed to be lived in.”
Kai rubbed the back of his head and winced when he smelled himself. “Scratch that, I’d better take a shower before eating. Second door on the left, right?”
Alexis narrowed her eyes. “Don’t you dare desecrate my shower. It’s a one-person cubicle, you hear me?”
Kai grinned as he set off after Christina. “As if I’d do that. I can’t promise anything for Christina, though.”
Alexis sent the house bots instructions to steam clean the bathroom the moment they’d vacated her quarters as she made her way to the galley to put a meal together. It was good to have someone to cook for. A mind that worked continuously like hers needed the distraction of a simple physical activity every once in a while.
You know, just in case some person she cared about enjoyed food and hadn’t realized who her parents were.
Maybe she needed to set up a fake persona.
Gemini appeared on the wallscreen. “Before you make your selection, let me show you this video ADAM sent me.”
Alexis’ mouth curled in a wicked smile as the video ran. “I think bistok would be a more appropriate choice.” She consulted the recipe guide in the galley’s database and had the food processing unit give her the ingredients.
She had Gemini put on some music and made pastry while she thought about how they might force the cell into action.
An attack might appear the obvious solution, but it might spook them into suiciding if that was their ultimate goal. She wished Paul Jacobsen’s autopsy had been more useful, but nanocyte failsafes were universal, and the death of the host had triggered the ones in the compound he’d ingested to self-destruct.
Christina knocked on the open door as she entered the galley. “Hey, thanks for letting me use your stuff.” She noticed the ingredients laid out. “What are you making?”
Alexis looked up from shaping the roll of stuffing in the center of the huge filet of bistok on the counter and pointed her spoon at Christina. “I’m going to have to have the whole bathroom refitted before I can use it again.”
Christina held up her hands. “I didn’t do anything in your bathroom except wash off the stink of being cooped up with a male for three days. I thought the house bots were a little too eager to get in there.”
Alexis gave her a skeptical look. “It’s a variation on a recipe from the database, Beef Wellington. Except I’m using bistok since I saw the funniest video just as I was deciding what to cook.”
Christina took one look at Alexis’ smirk and groaned as the realization hit. “You try to keep the training for new recruits interesting when you’re stuck aboard a warship.”
Alexis waved her protest off. “Having been a recruit on a warship, I salute your attempt to keep things fresh.” She broke into giggles. “What were you thinking when it had you mashed up against the wall with its ass?”
Christina tapped her lips with a finger. “Um, that I was in a shitty situation, and I sure as hell hoped that years down the line, my predicament would be a source of amusement for one of Bethany Anne’s kids?” She chuckled. “Give me a break already.”
“I can give you some potatoes to peel,” Alexis offered, indicating the pan in the sink. “I have the start of an idea, but I could use someone to bounce it off.”
Christina selected a vegetable peeler from the magnetic strip over the sink and found a small colander to catch her peels, then got to work. “What’s your idea?”
Alexis returned to her task, wrapping the rolled bistok in pastry. “I’m not entirely sure yet. We don’t know enough about them, even with Gemini’s access to their systems.”
“We know they’ve been brainwashed by someone,” Christina stated sourly. “Just listening to the audio from the bug is enough to convince anyone that what these people need is a short stay in a psychiatric ward to have the shit cleared out of their brains. I’d feel sorry for them if we hadn’t spent the last two weeks listening to them imagining what their orders will be.”
Alexis knew empathy could only go so far. “I feel sorrier for the victims of their next attack if they pull it off before we stop it. We need to engineer an event that will make them reach out to their handler.”
Christina tossed a potato into the pan of water. “I sense we’re getting to your plan.”
“Your senses are on the nose,” Alexis replied. “I’m thinking we give them a little love tap with the Gemini, just enough to make sure they have to come into dock somewhere.”
“I thought you didn’t want to spook them?” Christina asked.
“This ship has Shinigami cloaking,” Alexis told her. “Ships get dinged by rocks all the time. They’ll just think they caught some bad luck when one takes out their…” Her voice trailed off. “That’s as far as I got with that part.”
Christina paused in peeling. “There’s another part?”
Alexis nodded. “One minute.” She took the tray holding the bistok wellington over to the oven and put it in, setting the timer. “Are the potatoes ready?”
Christina showed her the pan. “Is that enough?”
Alexis shook her head and grabbed a peeler. “That’ll feed Gabriel’s greedy ass. Anyway, my plan. While we’re playing pinball, you and Kai will go to the target destination and bump into the cult when they dock.”
“And do what?” Christina asked. A skeptical frown creased her forehead. “It’s pretty long odds we’d run into the same people twice without meaning to. They won’t think it’s a coincidence.”
“Exactly,” Alexis agreed. “They’re already paranoid. All we’re going to do is give them a little nudge.”
Christina waved for Alexis to elaborate. “Go on.”
“That’s where it gets tricky,” Alexis adm
itted. “We’ll need K’aia and Trey to help out, and I hope your dad doesn’t mind lending us a few things.”
Beyond Federation Borders, Uncharted System, SD Reynolds
The superdreadnought exited the Gate into the fifteenth and final coordinates on their route.
“It’s almost over,” Jiya enthused as the scan data began coming in. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I think I miss being attacked everywhere we go. At least I had something to do.”
“Something wrong with my company?” Reynolds teased.
Jiya ran a hand through her hair and sighed. “More like I’m bored with my own company. There’s not much for a first officer to do on an assignment like this beyond keeping morale up.” She laughed. “Techies in their element don’t need much encouragement.”
“What about the scenery?” Reynolds argued, pointing out the planet suspended on the viewscreen. “You don’t see too many water worlds.”
“Are you forgetting Krokus-4?” Jiya gave him a sideways look. “Besides, most of our stops were in places where there was absolutely nothing to look at unless you have a love for gazing endlessly into the void.”
Reynolds was distracted from Jiya’s grumbling by an unexpected presence letting himself into his systems. He extracted his consciousness from the bridge and rushed to meet the closest thing an AI had to a parent. ADAM, what brings you here?
>>Your datastream is showing us you’ve come across an ocean planet,<< ADAM informed him after they’d exchanged pleasantries. >>Bethany Anne wants to know if it’s a suitable habitat for the Collectives.<<
I have to admit I’m not familiar with the species, Reynolds told him with regret.
>>No worries,<< ADAM assured him. >>Here, this should help.<<
Reynolds assimilated the information that arrived and found he understood Bethany Anne’s anger on the Collectives’ behalf entirely. Whatever my crew and I can do to help these beings, we’re in. I don’t need to ask to know that every soul aboard would volunteer without hesitation when they find out what they’ve gone through at the hands of the Seven.
Return Of The Queen: The Kurtherian Endgame™ Book Eight Page 12
