by Blaze Ward
Grace didn’t have any weapons in her hands as they got to the top of the stairs. She pulled him close enough that he could feel the heat radiating off her skin.
“I’ll approach and distract them,” she whispered. “You keep anyone from coming up behind.”
He had a hard time not staring at her chest, the way the shirt billowed open. He doubted Ardna’s thugs would even try.
Lazarus settled for a silent nod.
Grace slid from the stairwell and stumbled across the hallway, using the wall to catch herself in an amazing imitation of staggering drunk.
“Whoopsie,” she said in a voice like she was talking to herself a little too loud. “This way.”
He watched her by sliding himself against the far edge. If he didn’t stick his head out, the guards down there were as invisible as he was.
“Hey, boys,” Grace slurred her. “I’m horny. Who wants to fool around?”
Lazarus remembered he was supposed to have her back, so he shifted to the other side and tracked the woman with his ears while his eyes and barrel quested aft.
“Who are you?” a male voice called in a low voice.
Quiet enough that nobody beyond a door would probably hear and want to interrupt a beautiful woman half-dressed and offering herself.
Lazarus heard a sound like Grace staggering into the wall again.
“Ardna brought me aboard as a surprise present fer someone,” she mumbled loud enough. “Got a little drunk and tired of waiting. Need a man. You two man enough?”
That was cold. Challenging two thugs to take you at the same time? And drunk?
Lazarus smiled and listened. She was getting closer now.
“We’re on duty, lady,” another voice said, just as quietly. “What cabin are you in? We’ll come for you in a while when the boss is done.”
“You’re cute,” Grace said brightly. “So’s your friend. I wanna ride you like a pony.”
The next sound Lazarus heard only made sense if Grace punched one of them in the balls as hard as she could, pivoted, and drove a fist into the side of an unprepared head, into one of the soft spots. Then a couple of sharp kicks to settle the motion.
Followed only then by two bodies collapsing. Lazarus exploded into motion, checking aft quickly for movement and then turning forward in case Grace needed help.
She might need help dragging the two bodies out of her way. Not much more.
The smile on her face was calm glory. She gestured him closer.
“Let’s move,” Lazarus whispered into the stairwell.
“Was he at his desk?” Grace asked Aileen as they were all up front and set for violence.
Lazarus turned Oluchi to cover their rear now, and brought Xiuying and his repeat blaster up to the door.
“He was, last time,” Aileen said. “Six men around him, four with guns and two have little wands that shock you.”
Grace looked up at Lazarus and he nodded.
“There is a desk on the right as you enter,” Grace said. “Two chairs on this side. Probably the six are in a circle five yards across, surrounding your friend and keeping her from moving.”
“Capital,” Xiuying smiled, patting his weapon. “I’ll take care of them, then. You lot handle Ardna. Haven’t see Khan yet, so hopefully he’s in there waiting for me like a bride on her wedding night.”
Xiuying turned and nodded at Aileen with a grim smile, and then a much happier one to Lazarus.
Again, Lazarus watched Grace defer to him. She didn’t have to, but Eduardo had obviously told her to listen to the Rio Alliance officer. And she was probably a better shot than the rest of them.
“You take Ardna,” Lazarus decided. “Xiuying softens up the room. Aileen, you stay off to one side. Oluchi, you’ve got the rear.”
Aileen was pulling a pistol off one of the downed goons, but he wasn’t going to argue with her right now. She’d been a good enough shot to nail him with a cargo harpoon, back on Zhoonarrim Station.
Lazarus stepped to the door. Double wide. Possibly locked. Not all that rugged, compared to some of the doors he’d had to go through in his time.
He turned to Xiuying.
“I’ll knock it open, then you go to town,” Lazarus said.
Any man who brought a weapon like that to raid a yacht had to know what he was doing. And the man had been starkly professional tonight.
Xiuying grinned.
Lazarus tested the lock, just to be sure. It seemed to turn, but he didn’t want movement warning anyone inside, so he put his rifle across his back, grabbed both handles, and jammed them down, surging forward.
The doors parted like the Red Sea and Lazarus stumbled into the room. Rather than try to do anything, he just kept moving, shifting to his left as he saw all the people on his right before going to his knees.
That got him out of the way.
Xiuying wasn’t a butcher. No, he was an artist. Holding a repeating blaster rifle. The sound was like a drunk woodpecker.
A woodpecker the size of a blue whale. The roar was deafening in the confined space.
And then silence. Just like that.
Not just like that. Strav Ardna had moved, possibly at the first sign of trouble. He was around the desk now, with a pistol in one hand and holding it against Eha’s head, while his other had hold of her neck and kept her from moving away.
All the other goons were dead, smoking on the floor.
“I’ll kill her,” he screamed. “Don’t you touch me or she’s dead.”
Lazarus started to stand, trying to find a way to get to the man before he could act. If Ardna pulled the trigger, she was dead and Strav Ardna would be in hell a second later, but he knew that. Wanted to survive.
Wanted a way out of this killzone he had brought them all into.
Their eyes met across the space. Strav Ardna didn’t look Human right now. Rage and specism had taken over. Lazarus wondered how much longer Eha would have been alive, had they not intervened.
“You,” Ardna sputtered as he focused on Lazarus.
His mouth opened to say something, but Grace shot him, dead center of the face and snapped the skull back and up. The body fell bonelessly to the deck as the pistol clattered noisily.
Eha’s scales were all as flared out as he’d ever seen a Churquen get. Lazarus stepped close enough for her to focus on him.
Light came back into them. She smiled.
Eha surprised him with a hug as fierce as Aileen’s had been.
Thirty-Five
Eha
She’d been sure she was dead. Eha had done everything she could, used every evasion and misdirection she had ever learned in several decades of being a spy to confuse the Human.
In the end, it wouldn’t have been enough. Or rather, it probably would have been, and he’d have turned to torture to get the details she wouldn’t tell him otherwise.
But Strav Ardna was dead now.
She didn’t understand any of it, still woozy from the brutality the other Humans had used on her and Aileen when the mighty furball decided to fight back.
Eha smiled at the memory of four Humans being necessary to stop one angry Yithadreph. And them armed with stun sticks of some sort.
She finally let go of Lazarus enough to stare at his face.
Frightened, but for her. Protective. Perhaps as much as Addison would have been, had he been here.
There were others. Aileen. Three Humans, one of which looked female, since she was smaller than the other two and built more like Aileen. Breasts. Curves.
There was still an edge of terrible lethality about the woman.
Her skin was a brown darker than umber, so radically different from the freckled paleness of Lazarus. For any race other than Humans she would have guessed the woman to be a different species, but she already knew Humans showed more genetic diversity than any other species in space. One of the men looked close enough to Lazarus to be of the same subspecies, but the other had skin nearly golden, with radically different b
ones in the face and eye sockets not nearly as round.
So interesting.
“Eha, these are my friends,” Lazarus said, gesturing to them. “You remember Oluchi Pryce. This is Grace Savidge and Xiuying Bălan. You’re safe now.”
“Thank you,” she breathed, including Aileen in her look.
Then she studied the rest of the room. Felt her scales flare out all the way again.
Seven dead Humans. Strav Ardna and six guards. Gone so fast it was still a blur and a roar to her.
Eha turned to the side, keeping one arm around Lazarus for strength, both physical and moral. She’d imagined Human violence. Dreamed terrible nightmares about it.
She’d dreamed too small.
Lazarus turned to the Human woman, seeming to concede to her control of the situation. Eha wondered who the woman was.
Grace Savidge pulled out a hand communicator and pressed a button. Put it to her ear. Grimaced.
“It’s done,” she said simply. “Ruthlessly.”
She listened, turning to watch the two alien women and the one Eha supposed could be classified as an alien man. Human friends had been a theoretical thing.
Now, she had one. At least one, from the welcoming looks on the others.
Grace turned to Lazarus with the device still to her ear.
“What about innocents?” she asked.
“There aren’t any on this ship.” Oluchi Pryce stepped closer.
He still looked a little older than Lazarus. A shade taller, but leaner. Prettier, if she had to put a word to it, but she wasn’t sure how Human males would react to the term, if they were anything at all like Churquen.
“Pryce?” Grace turned to the newcomer.
“Ardna was capable of monitoring and recording cabins I was assured were utterly private when I was last aboard,” Oluchi Pryce said. “So he’s probably blackmailing a few people. Or was. That means the crew is complicit. And the thugs who came at us in the car with guns and threats don’t get to claim innocence now. I’m with Lazarus. They’re bullies who met a bigger fist.”
“Eduardo?” Grace said into the comm.
Eha had no idea who she was talking to, but it appeared to be someone important. Her brain was still a little wobbly from the physical abuse.
“He recommends a terrible accident,” Grace said aloud. “With no survivors.”
“Good enough,” Lazarus said. “We can swim away.”
“I can’t,” Eha spoke up. “Churquen sink really well.”
Aileen stepped close.
“I’ll keep you safe, Eha,” she murmured.
Lazarus turned to the males.
“Oluchi, is there another diving helmet we can steal?” he asked. “The storm’s too big for surface swimming.”
The man thought for a moment.
“Yes, near the fantail.”
“Good, you and Xiuying go get it and we’ll meet you there,” Lazarus said. “Kill anyone you encounter.”
“And you?” Xiuying asked.
“Grace and I will sabotage the engines to cause an explosion and fire,” he said. “That will destroy most of the evidence, and it’s not like Yisan has much of a police force to investigate it afterwards. We’ll be gone quickly from this planet anyway and only us and Eduardo will know the truth.”
Lazarus turned within her arm to study her.
“Eha, I’m sorry,” he said simply. “For all of this. Hopefully, you and Addison will be mollified by such an offering. You and Aileen go with Oluchi, and we’ll be up shortly.”
Eha leaned close enough to rest her cheek on his shoulder, just happy to be alive. Lazarus was right, though. Addison would be furious, so they might have to skip over some of the details. She could only imagine what he might have done had she died here.
It was wonderful, having such a mate that he might consider rising to the Human level when it came to violence, but counter-productive, if they wished Human assistance overthrowing the Innruld.
Oluchi stepped closer now and smiled diffidently.
“Are you ready?” he asked, holding out a hand like a gentlemen biped helping a lady into a vehicle.
She took it, understanding the cultural translation and accepting him. Her own wits and reflexes felt like she was wrapped in cotton batting as everything was just slightly the wrong color.
She followed the smaller Human past the bodies and into the corridor. Up a spiraling staircase that was actually probably easier for her to use than Humans, although Aileen’s quiet grumbles weren’t silent.
The vessel felt like it was rocking harder than it had earlier. Perhaps a storm was rising outside.
Eha had spent most of her adult life on space stations, rather than the surface of planets. The very concept of a boat floating on a large body of water was so alien and frightening to the Churquen that she had wondered if Ardna had done this to her on purpose, but none of the Humans seemed fazed by it. Yithadreph were already a semi-aquatic species.
The group emerged onto the main deck she remembered, her vision finally settling and growing crisper as the various shocks began to wear off. The space looked like a lounge, with a bar to one side and bench couches with pillows where Humans might enjoy relaxing.
Nothing for her to settle in a good coil.
She watched water actually fall from the sky outside a window.
Oluchi opened what she had thought was a closet and pulled out a helmet for a Human. She would have said a helmet for a space suit, but this ship didn’t fly.
Diving helmet. For Humans to swim beneath the water.
What a terrifying concept.
“May I?” he asked as he stepped close.
Aileen and the other man, Xiuying, were watching both ways with guns, so Eha tried to relax.
She nodded and watched Oluchi step close and make adjustments to the thing in his hands. It split open in a ring at the bottom, and he reached around to rest it on her neck.
“This is designed for Human skin, so it will inflate enough to press and hold,” he said, studying her closely. “I have no idea how it will work on scales, so I’m going to set it to maintain positive pressure, meaning it will leak bubbles around you constantly, but that should keep water out, and there is enough power for the gills to run for days, even doing this.”
Gills? Ah, artificial gills pulling oxygen out of the water for a Human to breathe.
Bizarre.
Still, it might be possible to adapt such a thing for a Churquen. She would need fins like her aquatic cousins if she chose to do this again, but she suspected that Humans could adapt something there as well.
The helmet ring closed around her neck and inflated. She had to hold herself still, as it felt like hands started to choke her.
“Are you okay?” Oluchi asked, staring at her from close.
“Yes,” she lied.
Mostly lied. This was what was necessary to get her off the boat and apparently make the ensuing event look like an accident. She would slither backwards across hot coals if that was what it took.
The back of the helmet was designed for Humans, of course. Their necks didn’t turn or flex like hers, so she would need to remain more still when they went into the water.
Into an ocean. During a storm.
She could see more water falling from the sky. Actual rain. And wind. The boat was turned into the storm, near as she could tell, but growing more wobbly every minute.
Oluchi pulled a back piece up and it clicked. She was half blind.
He smiled at her anyway.
“My eyes are more centered than yours,” he said with a friendly nod. “When we commission a version for you, it will have more glass.”
Like she was going to turn into an adventurer and swim in open water?
Eha reconsidered. She might. Already, she had done a score of crazy things, starting with fleeing the authorities at Zhoonarrim Station aboard Shiva Zephyr Glaive.
What was one more?
Oluchi took her hand and guided it to he
r right temple. Humans were right-hand dominant, for the most part.
“This button closes the faceshield,” he said. “Tap it when you’re ready.”
Eha took a breath and pressed. Three plates snapped out and locked together, both bottom sides and down from the top. The seam where they met was almost invisible. Soft lights came on inside the helmet and she felt it blow air into her face.
Oluchi grabbed his own helmet and donned it while she watched. Weirdly, he touched the flat parts of his window to hers.
“Can you hear me?” he asked.
Ah, useful. Vibrations passed through both systems if you didn’t have radios. Space suits worked in a similar manner, but she’d never imagined space-exploring underwater.
At least until tonight.
“I can,” Eha answered, watching him smile again.
For a Human she had known less than a day, he seemed like he was trying his damnedest to help. As were the others.
Lazarus had said that there would be Humans on her side. She hadn’t really believed it until now. The last several hours had left a sour taste in her mouth.
Oluchi stepped back and turned to the others, popping open his faceplate. Eha did the same.
“There’s a sled in the water nearby,” he announced. “I’m going to go try to recover it while you two keep watch for the others.”
Xiuying nodded, so Eha watched the man step out onto the rear deck of the vessel and felt the wind howl in through the open hatch. The open door had let in a tremendous wind and splattered rain on things. It would be ugly out there.
Then she would be going into water. How fast would she sink?
“You’ll be fine,” Aileen was suddenly close and holding her hand.
Eha wished she could agree, as she watched the Human close up his faceplate and dive headlong off the rear of the boat, disappearing from sight.
Thirty-Six
Oluchi
There was something to be said about casting loose from the man he’d been yesterday.
Oluchi knifed into the water like all the pretty women were watching from the flying bridge. Grace had set the sled to station-keeping on the ship, but the rain was bad enough he couldn’t see it from the deck.
