by S. J. Bryant
"Does anyone have any secret weapons up their sleeves?" Kari said.
"Now grenades seem like a good idea," Aydin muttered.
Kari rolled her eyes. Yes, even a grenade would be better than nothing right now, but Aydin's attitude wouldn't help them get out of the situation.
"I've only got what we've picked up on the way here," Ryker said, gesturing to his belt which sprouted basic plasma pistols and rifles. "Nothing special, nothing secret."
"We're all the same," Aydin said. "We're not going to pull a miracle out of our backsides."
"Just thought I'd ask," Kari said. That left only one option, and the enemy would know it. "Piper and Atticus stay back. The rest of us will attack and show these bastards what we can do."
"You want us to hide here while you risk your lives?" Atticus said.
"It's better than you dying for no reason."
"It's not happening," Atticus said.
"Perhaps there's another way," Piper said.
"What?" Kari said, eager for anything that would mean she didn't have to charge to almost certain death.
Piper lifted her head and drew a deep breath through her nose. "That smell."
Wren did the same and frowned. "Blanchard. I'm sure of it."
"You think she's here?" Kari said.
"Yes," Piper said.
"She survived," Kari said. Her thoughts raced. Was this a good or a bad thing? On the one hand, Blanchard was an evil bitch who deserved to die. But she was also in charge, if they could somehow use her…
"If we kill her," Ryker said. "The others might surrender."
Kari shook her head. "She's not the type to fight at the front. She'll send the others out first."
"And she's almost definitely called for backup," Aydin said.
Time slipped away from them. The longer they took to act, the closer Blanchard's allies got. If more of them arrived, Kari and her companions' chances of getting off of the space station alive disappeared. Time to act.
"Blanchard?" she called around the corner. Her voice echoed through the metal corridors.
Silence.
"Blanchard, I know you're there. Just wanted to talk."
A long pause. "Kari. I'm so glad you survived."
"Me too. Although I can't say the same for you. I suppose you must be inhuman to survive with no oxygen."
"Environmental suits. A good captain always has spare oxygen tanks."
"Good for you," Kari said, scrounging for ideas. "So, how about we put all this behind us. You let us leave, and we don't cause any more trouble."
"Any more trouble?" Blanchard said. "You've killed almost all my crew! I had to call in a favor from that swine Captain Trag and that bastard won't let me forget it."
Kari really didn't have time to discuss pirate politics. What did Blanchard expect? That she'd feel sorry for her? "You've seen what we can do. So just let us go."
"Exactly," Blanchard said. "I've seen what you can do. Do you know how much the mercenary crews will pay for that killer that travels with you? I knew she was good from the demonstration, but if I'd known how good…"
Kari glanced back at Wren who looked ready to fly around the corner and kill Blanchard despite her injuries. "What's the point?" Kari said. "You know we won't fight for anyone. We won't be slaves."
"Everyone says that at first," Blanchard said. "But trust me, enough torture, enough behavior management, and even the toughest soul can be broken."
"We'll kill you before you get the chance," Kari said.
"I don't think so," Blanchard said. "Your friend put on a good show, but from what the cameras saw, she got pretty injured in that engine room. I thought she was dead actually. Glad that she's not. But she won't be fighting like that for a while."
"Maybe not," Kari said. "But you haven't seen the rest of us fight."
"Then by all means," Blanchard said. "Give us a demonstration."
Kari floundered. This wasn't going at all as she'd planned. She'd hoped that Blanchard would be too scared or too curious, that she'd somehow be able to talk her way past. Apparently not.
"We'll come without a fight," Kari said. "None of us want to die."
Ryker elbowed her in the arm and glared.
"Ha," Blanchard said. "I suppose you had to try. But you didn't think I'd believe it?"
Kari hadn't, but she was running out of options. Each minute she spent talking with Blanchard was another minute for more enemies to arrive. They couldn't even try to sneak up the corridor while Blanchard was talking because she'd be able to see them through the cameras. If only she was blind—
"Piper," Kari whispered. "Where are the cameras that see this corridor and the next?"
"One above us. Two at the far corner. One at the end of the next corridor, and one thirty feet along it," Piper said without looking up.
Kari turned to Wren. "Think you can take them out?"
Wren hefted her gun and shot the camera directly above Kari's head without taking her eyes from Kari's face. "It's just a few blisters."
Four shots later and Wren had eliminated the cameras. A faint curse echoed down the corridor.
Kari leaned forward and the others gathered close. "They can't see us. That means they're going to have someone keeping watch around the corner to make sure we're not sneaking up. That gives us a target."
"A hard shot," Aydin said.
"But not impossible," Kari said. "And if we shoot close enough, they'll pull back and we'll have a clear break."
"A break with no cover," Aydin said.
"It's the best we're going to get," Kari said. "We move forward, keep low, and as soon as we see the bastards, we start shooting."
"I like it," Ryker said. "Clean."
That wasn't the word Kari would have used, but Ryker had a strange way of seeing things.
"We're coming too," Piper said.
Kari would have argued, but they didn't have time. "Fine. But stay near the back. Ready?"
They all nodded.
"On three. One. Two. Three!"
CHAPTER 28
Kari's toes curled inside her boots. They would only get once chance to fight their way out of this. Then Blanchard's allies would arrive, and they'd all be as good as dead. It all came down to Wren and her sharp shooting. Ordinarily, Kari would have had all the confidence in the world, but Wren's burned hands looked like twisted hunks of meat that left streaks of blood on her gun.
Wren's stony face was paler than usual, with a faint sheen of sweat. What if the pain and injuries put her off her game and they all died because of it? But they had no other options. Even at her worst, Wren was a better shooter than any of them. Kari had to trust that she would pull herself together and get them out of this.
Wren knelt at the corner and lifted her gun. It gleamed in the overhead lights, the smooth metal broken only by dried streaks of blood. Blisters—some burst and some swollen with liquid—stood out across her fingers. She took a deep breath, twisted around the edge of the hall, and fired.
Kari spun into the next passage as soon as the bright blast of plasma left Wren's gun. She fired at the corner where Blanchard and her companions were hiding. On the floor, sprawled halfway into the corridor, lay a young woman, a gun beside her. A smoking hole drilled through the middle of her forehead.
Even half-dead, Wren put any other marksman to shame.
Beside Kari came Ryker and Aydin, the others just behind. Their combined barrage turned the next corridor into a bright display of blue and red plasma bursts—like fireworks only much more deadly. The shots turned the passage walls to dark soot but they kept firing.
So long as Blanchard and her people were too scared to come around the corner—or even poke an arm around to fire back—then Kari and the crew had a chance of making it.
Their hurried footsteps clomped on the metal floor, keeping a steady rhythm interspersed with the irregular electric buzzes of the plasma blasts and the erratic explosions where the next passage led off.
A small bu
d of hope welled in Kari's chest. This was it, they just needed to get a few more feet and they'd be on the corner and bearing down on Blanchard and her lot. They'd be taken, overwhelmed, and Kari could get the hell off of this space station.
"I said get out there!" Blanchard's roaring voice came over the rumble of gunfire, then a body burst out from between the bright lights. It staggered and fell, as if pushed, but managed to get out into the corridor without being turned to ash.
Bright plasma blasts lit up Taylor's face. He carried a pistol in each hand, but instead of firing he ran toward the corridor he'd just come from. "You bitch. You can't send me out here to—" Hands appeared, shoving him away, leaving him exposed to Kari and her crew.
He turned a pale face toward them.
"Taylor," Aydin said, stepping forward.
Taylor's throat bobbed. "Aydin. This is a misunderstanding."
"You're a lying bastard."
"No. It's just—" As he spoke, Taylor adjusted his grip on the guns, lifting them. Before Kari could yell a warning, Aydin fired. The blast took Taylor full in his smug face.
"Good riddance," Aydin said.
A sudden flurry of movement from the next corridor and a handful more people staggered out from behind cover as if pushed. Only these didn't waste time on talking. They fired.
A hot blast streamed past Kari's shoulder, prickling her skin. Another followed a moment later, closer, forcing Kari to step to the side of the passage.
More shadows moved out of the bright lights, most of them stumbling. One tripped on his own feet and fell to the floor with a hard thud. Wren's next shot took him between the eyes. Ryker took out another and Aydin shot one in the leg. The pirate jumped up on one foot but kept firing.
Sweat poured down Kari's face, the anxiety in her stomach amplified by the close confines of the corridor. Blanchard had shoved her people into action. If they'd just stayed down, in the next corridor, then Kari's crew could have taken them. But now it was like an old-fashioned war and there'd be heavy casualties on both sides. She wanted to turn and run back, to take what meager cover the corner to the next passage offered, but she couldn't. If she ran, the enemy would have a clear shot of her back. Not only that, but she'd be leaving the only friends she had behind.
What then? Die standing?
She squeezed the trigger and a stream of red plasma came out, melting the face of an old man who'd been pushed out of the corridor. He crumpled, screaming and clawing at what had been his nose.
Kari's stomach twisted but she forced herself to look away, on to the next target. They'd regrouped. Those at the back took cover behind the ones in front and they fired in a concentrated stream at Kari's group. Atticus lay on the ground several feet back, clutching his arm. Smoke poured out of a bloody wound in Ryker's shoulder.
So far they'd been lucky, but it wouldn't last long. Footsteps sounded around the corner. Reinforcements, but not many from the sound.
Wren moved her gun along the line of enemies. Paused, fired, paused, fired. Two more men fell dead. Her sharp aim had saved Kari's life but it also drew attention to Wren and now the whole troop of pirates—five of them—had their rifles locked on Wren's head.
Kari roared and fired. There was no way in hell she would let another one of her crew get injured. Wren had already been through enough and these bastards had a lot to answer for. She drew on every bit of training she'd ever had, on every hour she'd spent shooting bits of trash on Zenith, on her time in the rebellion, and on every firefight she'd had since. She took out the man closest to her, didn't stop to watch him fall, but instead moved on to the next target. Already dead—killed by Ryker. The third went down under Kari's shots.
The fourth and fifth shared a brief glance, easing the rain of fire for just a second. Two quick shots from Wren killed them both.
Kari gripped her gun tighter and stared at the carpet of bodies that lined the floor. How many dead people had she seen today? Too many, that was for sure. But they'd brought it on themselves, and hopefully the Universe would be better without them.
"It's over, Blanchard," she said. "Surrender."
Silence from the corridor beyond. Kari couldn't quite see into it, and to get there she'd have to step over the bodies. She glanced back at her companions. They looked alright. Aydin knelt beside Atticus who was sitting up. His pale face gleamed in the overhead lights but he didn't look too bad. Ryker's arm bled all over the floor, but Kari had seen him survive much worse.
"Blanchard, it's no good hiding."
"She's gone," Piper said. She stepped toward the corridor but Kari reached out and snatched her back. It would be just like Piper to walk right into the barrel of Blanchard's gun.
"She's right," Wren said, straightening. "She's gone."
"What do you mean gone?" Kari said. "She can't have disappeared."
"Of course not," Piper said.
"She's probably going to get a ship off this sinking death trap," Wren said.
Kari released her grip on Piper's shoulder. "She's going to get away."
"Yeah, lucky her," Wren said. "But unless there are two working ships on this thing, we'll be trapped. So maybe we should find her?"
Kari staggered around the corner. Sure enough, it was empty. Blanchard had run. "How the hell are we supposed to find her?"
Wren came around the corner and studied the floor. "Pity she didn't stand in a pool of blood or anything. I would have been able to track her."
"Can't you?"
"There's nothing here. It's just metal."
Kari turned in a tight circle. Perhaps if they split up, they might be able to find her… but that was stupid. She could be lying in ambush anywhere. And then what if the rest of the pirates arrived?
"Perhaps this will help?" Ryker said.
His injured arm hung at his side, but in his other hand he held a small screen split into a dozen different boxes.
"Security feed," Piper said. She grabbed it from Ryker, eyes flying between the different fields of view like an insect darting between mushrooms. "There she is."
Kari peered over Piper's shoulder, but each little square seemed to show the same stretch of gray corridor with no way to tell where any of it was.
"Come on," Piper said, turning and tearing away down the passage.
Kari sprinted after her. Solid boots pounded at her heels, telling her that Ryker was right behind. Cursing and a pained cry said that Atticus and Aydin were doing their best to follow. Wren, as usual, made no sound.
Piper rounded the next corner and went out of sight.
"Piper!" Kari's heart constricted in her chest. They had no idea how many people might still be alive on board the ship. What if some of them were waiting in ambush and Piper ran right into them? What if she was shot and…?
Kari couldn't bear to finish the thought. If something happened to Piper, she didn't think she'd ever be able to live with herself. "Piper, stop. You don't know what you might be running into."
Kari rounded the corner, breath heaving in her lungs. As if she hadn't been exhausted before, this mad sprint combined with her anxiety had her gasping for air.
Piper stood at the end of the next corridor. She waved the screen above her head. "I know exactly what I'm running into."
Kari scowled and did her best to keep running even though her body ached with injuries she didn't even know she had, and she wanted nothing more than to sleep. "You don't know where all those cameras are."
"Of course I do."
"How can you possibly know?" Kari said, coming to a wheezing stop at Piper's side. Atticus and Aydin limped up the corridor, Atticus' face pained. Kari was glad that it gave her a few moments to catch her breath.
"They have serial numbers in the bottom of each view," Piper said. "Counting outward from the bottom middle of the ship."
Sweat trickled down Kari's cheek as she stared at Piper. She loved her sister more than anything in the world, but sometimes Piper seemed something other than human. How long had she looked at the
screen? Not long enough to decipher the serial codes for the cameras and then equate that to the three-dimensional structure of the space station, of which she'd only seen a small part. But that was Piper. Kari had lost track of the number of times Piper had left her speechless, and that was just in the last two days.
"Thanks for waiting," Aydin said between breaths. Atticus leaned heavily on his shoulder and Aydin sported a few injuries of his own.
"Blame Piper," Kari said. "But she'll take it easy from now on."
"We can't," Piper said.
"Why not?"
"Because she's about to take your ship." Piper turned the screen around to show them. She'd enlarged one of the views—Blanchard climbing up Ghost's entrance ramp, a long gun in her hand.
Kari's heart twisted. Blanchard would only take Ghost if there weren't many other options left, which not only meant she and her crew didn't have a way to get off the station, but it also meant that bastard was stealing her ship.
"Aydin, you stay with Atticus," Kari said. "We've got to stop her."
"You can't leave me here," Aydin said.
"Do you want to abandon him on his own?"
Aydin glanced at Atticus who rolled his eyes. "I don't need a babysitter. I'll wait here and you can come and get me when this is sorted."
"Atticus—" Kari said.
He held up his hand. "Don't you have somewhere to be? I'd rather sit here anyway. I've seen enough death for one day." He pulled out of Aydin's arms and used the wall to slide to the floor where he sat, staring at the ground.
Kari knew that he needed something, someone to talk to perhaps. But she couldn't be that person, not right then. Once she had her ship back and they were safe away from this place, then maybe she'd think about offering counseling.
"She's starting it up!" Piper said and sprinted down the corridor.
Kari spared one last glance for Atticus before she dashed after Piper. The others clattered behind her, their footsteps echoing. What the hell would they do if they got to the airlock only to find Ghost gone?
