by A. B. Keuser
The fence flickered out in the section closest to them and they slipped in quickly as the tablet registered a second “glitch failure” in another part of the fence. They flared back to life as the trio rounded the far corner of the bunker.
Kiori pulled the det-stick from the pouch secured at her waist. A laser optic drill appeared in her other hand from God knew where. She drilled into the concrete far enough to expose the skeletal metal framing within. Depressing the det-stick, she held down the trigger for three seconds, spinning away as the back of the bunker blew out, concrete sizzling against the energy fence.
They piled through the fissure as quickly as they could, Kiori heading left to create their distraction, while he and Adilyn raced right. The bunker quickly wailed into lockdown mode, and Si pulled a black box from the pocket on his leg. Switching it on and selecting a random oscillation of frequencies, he threw it down the next intersecting path they came across, pausing only long enough to ensure it had attached to the ceiling before moving on.
The signal jammer would stop their wireless communications from having a clear feed. They couldn’t lock down if they didn’t get the command.
Sliding through the door his visor directed him to, he quickly shot the three Pääom workers inside. During a day shift, there would have been twelve. He wouldn’t have been able to get that many fast enough with a tranq pistol. As it was, the most damage he’d done to these three was to the one who’d been hit and then fallen down a short flight of stairs as he collapsed.
He sidled up to the control comp and pulled the retractable interface cord from the tablet, jacking in with a hard wire was the only way the program could be sure of grafting to the system.
Adi snugged herself against the door jamb, rifle at the ready.
“Listen, I’m sorry about earlier.” He watched the data flow through the buffers as he spoke, knowing she wouldn’t take her eyes off the hall. “You may have hit closer to home than I’m willing to admit.”
Adi didn’t look at him, her visor trained on the hallway. “Just promise me one thing. Stop acting like you don’t actually care. We all know you do. If nothing else, it’ll remind me you’re human every once in a while.”
The tablet chirped at him and he quickly untethered the cord.
Her eyes flicked to the screen quickly and then back to the corridor. “Didn’t it work?”
“On a time delay. It’ll broadcast in a half an hour. Once we’re well away.” He slipped the tablet into the pouch around his left leg, his thumb brushed over the power unit for the suit and sealed it. The energy fence would fail as soon as the tablet got within range, so he didn’t need to worry about keeping a hold of it any longer. “Let’s move out.”
They slipped into the hall silent as wraiths, and bled into the shadows. Winding their way back through the compound, they ducked and dodged out of view of any of the black clad officers stationed there.
Movement around a far bend had him tucking himself and Adi into an intersection. Vôner scowled at the floor, hands tucked behind his back.
Pressed back against the wall, they faded into the shadows, and Si calculated the ease with which he could break the man’s neck. Yella hadn’t said what he’d done to her, but Si was willing to bet the man deserved a painful, drawn-out death.
He clenched his fist and kept still, reasoning with himself that killing the man would give away their position. He couldn’t help Yella if he was in a Pääom holding cell awaiting his secondpublic execution.
He watched as a red-faced boy who couldn’t have been a day over eighteen hurried up, obstructing the official’s path.
“Out of my way!” Vôner’s hand pulled back as though to hit the boy.
“It’s a message for you, sir, urgent. You said you wanted any contact about Cholla brought to you immediately.”
He pointed to the man he’d been walking with. “Deal with this.”
“Yes, sir!” But Vôner ignored him.
“Where was it from?” he asked the messenger, their voices fading down the corridor.
Uncurling his fist, Si motioned for Adi to move out. Kiori’s suit showed on his visor’s radar screen as they slipped out behind the guards at the hole they’d blown, and Si turned a fleeting glance back at the compound as they faded back into the streets.
*
Reaching down, Si helped Kiori and Adi back into the ship. Adi closed the hatch as he pulled his helmet off and shivered as the cold air hit his sweaty face.
“That went well,” Goo said, pulling off her gloves and tossing them in her helmet on the floor.
Adi didn’t look as pleased as the weapon’s tech. “Don’t call it a success until the broadcast goes through.”
“I only killed two.”
Si nodded in understanding. She measured their success differently.
“Now we’re going to go get Dani, right?” Adi turned to Si with an oddly hopeful look.
“Yes.” He turned down the corridor toward the mission staging to take off his suit and said, “Let’s get off the ground, Obie. We’ve got to get her back.”
“I believe that would be ill-advised at this point, captain. Mr. Blue and two colleagues await you in the main hold. I did not permit them open access to me or my systems.”
Si felt the growl in his throat and checked it before it could rumble out. “Thank you.”
He had half a mind to tell her to deal with them, but he knew what that would mean… another three bodies and another three names to add to the long list eating at the back of his brain.
Stepping through the hatch, he watched the three men turn in unison.
“What do you want?” If they weren’t wasting time he could be using to get to Yella, he might have been nicer about it.
“We’re here to discuss your return to duty.” Mr. Blue said with his patented smile—the one that made you unsure if he was happy or a perhaps a little insane.
“Save it for another time, boys. I’ve got more important things to tackle, and you need to make sure Kosz doesn’t implode.”
“By setting that information in motion, you may have given the Pääom enough reason to do what they did to Perhonen, here.” Stapleton’s brow knit together as his mouth pursed in worry.
“Then you should consider evacuation measures,” Adilyn said from behind him.
“I’m very glad to see you’re alive as well Adilyn, and we are.” Jordan Krace shuffled sideways to stand beside Blue and looked hopefully up at Si. “Our numbers are vastly depleted. You could easily take all of us off planet.”
“And then what?”
Mr. Blue fidgeted, tugging at his sleeves as he straightened and looked at Si with a determined glare. “We would use Oath Breaker as the base for the reunited Abolitionist movement.”
“We’ve prepared our people, they can be onboard in less than twelve hours.” Stapleton was trying to soften Blue’s demands, some things hadn’t changed.
Osiris set his jaw. “Find another ship. We’ve got someplace to be and I can’t wait twelve hours to get there.”
“Oath Breaker informed us of Danielle’s abduction. I am sorry for that loss, but think of the number of lives you’re forsaking for hers.” Jordan Krace stepped forward, his hands out in apologetic supplication.
Stepping back, Si leveled his gaze at the three men. “I will only say this once. Danielle Cholla has given up more than any of you for me. I will not let her die for me also.”
“Be reasonable, Osiris.” Mr. Blue’s sputtered demand seemed to be the tip of the outraged iceberg hiding within the man’s portly frame, and Si didn’t have time to argue.
“Get off my ship now, or I’ll let Obie deal with you. I think we all know what that means.”
“You’d let her kill us?”
“Right now?” He’d let them believe the lie. “Yeah. Now leave, or I’ll seal you on this deck and pretend you don’t exist.”
Jordan Krace and Stapleton moved hesitantly toward the hatch. Mr. Blue stood his ground.
“You don’t have many friends, Osiris. I wouldn’t suggest alienating those of us willing to help you.”
“He can help himself.” Goo stepped forward, her rifle leveled at Blue’s gut and the man cast one final glare at Si before he joined the others at the hatch, they pulled on dark cloaks and disappeared into the night.
“Obie, get us the hell off this rock.” The words came quietly through Si’s clenched teeth.
“Acknowledged, Captain. I already have the heavy air thrusters spooling. As soon as you three are secured, I will commence lift off.”
“You heard her.” Si led the way to the lift and didn’t object when they both followed him to the bridge.
Strapped in and buckled down, they all weathered the launch silently. Obie had overwritten the ground clamp the port put on all docking ships when they landed. Nothing held her back. They got several terse orders to desist and return to the launch pad, but there was nothing ground control could do and Oath Breaker could handle the few drones they’d send after her.
When they broke the planet’s gravitational pull, Osiris threw off his straps and told Obie to bring up the Fluff ‘n Stuff’s trajectory. He scanned the flight path as Adi and Kiori stirred behind him.
“Though it was not asked, I made a note of a second ship that took off ten minutes ago that is on the same path. it launched from the Pääom outpost.”
“Vôner.” So Stugg had more masters than one could faithfully obey.
As he watched the trajectories, he pushed away the regret that accompanied the knowledge one of those masters would likely kill the pissant boy before he got the chance.
He turned back to Kiori. “When we get to Torjunta, I’m going to want light weapons, but I think we need something with a lot of kick as well. This is not a surgical mission, I’m authorizing a full scale bash and dash. We get her, we destroy as much as necessary to do so and we get out. Think you can get us set up for that?”
“I can.” She looked at him and he could tell she disagreed with some part of his plan. “I’ll do more than necessary.”
With that, she moved quickly out of the bridge and Si knew the full potential of the ships weapons locker would be utilized.
He turned to Adi, about to give her an order, but stopped. The smile on her face was eerie. “What?”
“Thanks for being human, you selfish bastard.”
“You think I made the wrong choice?” Si asked.
“Hell yes you did. But if I was the one on my way to a Mandall torture-fest, it’s the choice I hope you’d make again.”
She punched him squarely in the shoulder and her face turned a sickly green. Her eyes widening as she stared at the screen behind him. “Mother of God.”
Si turned to see the PCN broadcasting its transmission. It would play the full extent of the file as it downloaded into whatever hard drive it could, giving people across the galaxy the truth about the Pääom. Si only hoped it would facilitate a just end.
TWENTY
Dani sat against the bulkheads, shivering as the cold metal seeped through her clothes. She’d scooted far enough into the corner that the bare bulb flickering in the storage closet ceiling only illuminated the toe of her left boot. She’d dozed fitfully throughout the journey, but she knew the sound of engines switching to heavy air.
They were landing.
The thrum of the engines jiggled the deck plating beneath her, and soon she was sitting on dead nerve endings. That wouldn’t do her any favors when she got out of the cramped space, but there was nothing she could do about it now.
She heard another argument outside the door. Someone wanted to know who she was, but Stugg wasn’t telling. He had strict orders to keep it under wraps until he got “them” to Franklin or Theodore.
The ship set down as Dani’s body regulated to the planet’s gravity. She waited for Stugg to come retrieve her, her muscles coiled. When the door clicked open, she sprung, taking the boy by surprise with a knee to the nads. She pushed him aside and flung herself down the corridor. If she could find the cockpit, she could seal herself inside and get off planet… or she could send out a distress call, if nothing else.
Stugg lunged, grabbing her around the ankles and dropping her to the floor. Her head hit the corridor’s hatch tread and her vision split in two as bile rose to her throat. Stugg pulled a sack over her head knotting it around her neck as someone else yanked her hands painfully behind her and trussed them together.
Heavy footsteps came toward them at a run and whoever it was stopped close enough to her that their footsteps jostled her head on the deck plating. Waves of nausea crashed over her.
“Shouldn’t you have taken care of that before?” A voice that sounded oddly familiar said above her. It wasn’t Stugg, but she couldn’t put her finger on who she thought it was—and that had nothing to do with the fact Stugg had her hands tied together.
Her breath bounced back at her from the dark cloth as she inhaled in through her mouth and exhaled through her nose to keep from vomiting. That would be a messy end.
“Get out of my way, Mandall. I’ve got orders and they don’t include submitting to your inspection.”
“Who is she, Stugg? I’ll find out soon enough.”
A second hand coiled around her bicep, just long enough for Stugg to pull her away, her head spun at the movement, but she couldn’t throw her hands out in front of her to stop herself. She crashed into the bulkhead sending a searing pain through her shoulder.
“Nial.” She should have recognized his voice right away, but she hadn’t, maybe because of the splitting headache that was seeping through her synapses. Her voice didn’t carry far enough as Stugg pushed her forward, she struggled against him, trying to shout to Nial—he’d help her. Mandall or not.
The gun dug into her ribs again, and while she didn’t think Stugg would shoot her, another wave of nausea overtook her and she subsided—for now.
Stugg led her out of the ship, telling her when each hatch tread cropped up and helping her over. If he hadn’t been the one to bag and bind her, she might have thought he cared.
He pushed her into a chair and tied her hands’ bindings to the back. Then he knelt down and she turned her head away from his sour breath.
“I’m sorry Dani, but I’m not supposed to let anyone know you’re here. I managed to wrangle some cooperation out of the Mandalls on that point. They wanted to string you up for everyone to see. But I’ve got your back. Don’t worry, I’ll get you out of here in one piece. You’re in high demand, everyone seems to want you. The Mandalls may be at the top of that list, but they want Osiris more.”
His hand fell to her shoulder squeezing it, and she bit her tongue to keep from crying out as pain shot up her neck and down her arm.
“Everything’s going to be okay.”
Then he left her.
In the darkness of the bag over her head, she listened for anything she could to give her a clue about where she was. Nothing. There wasn’t a sound after Stugg left, a heavy door closing behind him.
*
She’d nearly dozed off when the door opened again. It felt like hours later, three sets of footsteps echoed around her. Rough movement at her neck told her someone was removing the bag, Stugg no doubt.
The bag pulled away and searing lights stabbed at her eyes. It was too much. Leaning to the side, Dani voided her stomach. What little it had contained splattered on a rough concrete floor and onto Stugg’s scuffed boots. Served the little weasel right.
Her eyes adjusted slowly as she blinked away the glaring floaters and she cast a quick look around. It was a warehouse facility, stacked with crates in random piles, except around her. Production must be down at their arms manufacturing plants if they could spare this much space… even for her.
Theodore Mandall stood in front of her, the eldest of his clan, even before Si killed his brothers. Weathered skin hung from his face like the jowls of a dog. He gave her a little smile as she looked at up him. “I’m sorry we had to go about
it this way, but you’ve always been loyal to the wrong people.”
“I think that’s an argument we could both make.” Dani said, her mind still reeling from her skull’s introduction to the hatch tread.
Franklin stood in the back, his hand resting on his pistol. He nodded to Stugg behind her and then looked back at the door. “You aren’t needed any longer, Boy.”
“I told you I don’t leave her side until I’m paid.”
Theo held his pulse rifle loosely in his hand, but Dani saw the threat as he pointed it at the boy. “You’ll get what’s coming to you, as soon as we know you weren’t telling us tales about Bowlin.”
“Ask Dani, she’ll tell you,” Stugg said, and she heard the faint pitch in his voice as the boy stepped around them with his shoulders flung back as though he expected one of them to rush him.
Instead, Theo turned to her, “So, is it true, is the hope of the Abolitionist cause back from the dead?”
She stared at him blankly, blinking in confusion, “Who?”
“Don’t play games with us, Danielle. We sent you out to get the Oath Breaker and you go off course. Why, if not to help the man who was so close to your family?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. Stugg’s been killing my crew, he’s the reason we’re off course. He’s gone crazy, claims to see ghosts. The ship is creepy, I can’t fault him that… but he’s only made it worse by killing the others.” She didn’t have to play up her labored breath, the knock to her head was making it difficult to speak. Each inhale threatened to send her into a dry heave.
“I don’t think we can trust either of them.” Franklin said, slapping the heavy muzzle of his rifle into his palm.
Stugg choked out a o as he moved around her. “You can! He’s going to be right after me. He swore it.”
