The Fallen Empire Collection by Lindsay Buroker

by Discover Sci-Fi Special Edition

  “That’ll teach you to bank on planets that are imperial strongholds.”

  “Yes, I should borrow money from the mafia instead,” Alisa said. “That’s much safer.”

  “Keep teasing me, Captain, and I won’t save you any duck.”

  The sound of chickens squawking floated through the airlock tube, and Alisa rubbed a hand down her face as a few of Beck’s munching visitors cast curious looks in that direction. She didn’t mind that one of her passengers had a cargo of her own, but the chickens had gotten a taste for freedom somewhere along the way and kept escaping their pen. Alisa had found one pecking at cracker crumbs on the floor of NavCom that morning.

  Movement in the airlock tube drew her eye. It wasn’t a chicken. Instead, Leonidas and Dr. Alejandro Dominguez were walking out. Leonidas was dressed in plain civilian clothes today, not wearing his favorite military jacket, the one with the big Cyborg Corps patch on the front. He must have decided that blatantly announcing what he was—and what he had been for the empire—wasn’t a good idea on a space station owned by the Tri-Sun Alliance.

  Alejandro was dressed in his gray monk’s robe, a robe Alisa was increasingly convinced was nothing but a costume for him, and wore his satchel over his shoulder, his hand cupped protectively over a bulge inside of it.

  “Taking your orb for a walk, Doctor?” Alisa asked as they approached.

  She gave Leonidas a respectful nod while wishing that he would walk at her shoulder instead of at the doctor’s. She had tried to hire him a couple of times now, but he was determined to help Alejandro with his mysterious mission, one that apparently involved fulfilling Emperor Markus’s dying wishes.

  Leonidas nodded back at her, a polite comrade-to-comrade gesture, as usual. If he had figured out that thoughts of kissing him had popped into Alisa’s mind lately, he never showed it. It was just as well. Those thoughts felt like a betrayal to her late husband, who had only been gone for eight months.

  Alejandro pressed his palms together in front of his chest, bowed, and said, “Trust thy neighbor, but lock your door.”

  The gray robe might be a costume, but he certainly had his Xerikesh memorized, front to back.

  “It’s my door, Doc,” Alisa said.

  He gave her an edged smile and continued on.

  “Here, mech, try this will you?” Beck asked, sticking out his tongs to stop Leonidas, a slightly charred cube of duck grasped in the tips.

  Leonidas paused to frown over at him. Alejandro stopped to wait, but his gaze was toward the crowd, and Alisa wondered if he also had a contact to meet here. Maybe he was looking for someone else to ferry him around the system. Thanks to a bit of eavesdropping, Alisa knew he believed she had too much knowledge of his quest—and that he had not-so-jokingly asked Leonidas if he would consider making her disappear. It was all she could do not to curl a lip at Alejandro’s back and growl every time he walked past.

  “If you’re thinking of poisoning me,” Leonidas said, “it’s unlikely that it will work.”

  “Because you have enhanced taste buds, I know. You told me.” Beck waved the duck at his nose. “That’s why I want you to try my spice blend. Tell me what you think.”

  Alisa arched her eyebrows. Beck and Leonidas had anything but a cordial relationship—indeed, Leonidas was eyeing those tongs suspiciously and looked like he was contemplating breaking them, as he’d broken Beck’s handgun on the first day they met. She was surprised at this new turn, at least on Beck’s part.

  With gingerliness that was amusing from a man with arms like tree trunks, Leonidas plucked the duck cube from the tongs. He held it to his nose, letting his nostrils thoroughly examine the scent, that suspicious squint never leaving his face. Who could blame him? There was a prodigious warrant out for Leonidas’s arrest, something that Beck had originally brought to Alisa’s attention. As amiable as Beck was, he had been intrigued by the idea of collecting two hundred thousand tindarks. He had even brought up the idea of sedating Leonidas with his food. And now that they were orbiting Arkadius, Beck would not have to travel far to turn him in.

  “Celery seed?” Leonidas lifted his eyebrows.

  Beck grinned. “One of my secret ingredients.”

  “On duck?”

  “It’s not like those are Old Earth ducks. Arkadian ducks are fierce and need fierce seasonings. Did you know they’re tall enough and tough enough to bite your asteroids off? Assuming they didn’t enhance those for you when they were doing the rest. Are cyborgs susceptible to kicks in the gonads?”

  Leonidas glanced south, then skewered Beck with a look that was more unfriendly than Alisa thought the conversation called for.

  “Listen,” Beck said, waving at the duck and ignoring the glare, “are you going to condemn it before you’ve even tried it?”

  “You know imperials are hard to please,” Alisa said.

  Leonidas turned his unfriendly look on her, and she lifted her hands in innocence. Imperials were touchy, too, it seemed. Just because they had lost the war—and control of the fifty-odd planets and moons in the trinary star system…

  Leonidas sighed and dropped the duck into his mouth. He chewed thoughtfully—or perhaps with thoughts geared toward detecting hints of poison or otherwise suspicious substances.

  “Leonidas?” Alejandro prompted, an irritated frown on his face as a woman heading for the grill jostled his satchel. “The captain said she’s leaving as soon as her cargo is picked up and that we need to be back quickly if we don’t want her to leave without us.”

  His irritated expression turned a touch wistful, as if he wouldn’t mind that. Well, Alisa wouldn’t mind that, either, but for the moment, their missions were intertwined. Alejandro needed to talk to the Starseers about his artifact quest, and Alisa needed to find out why a group of them had stolen her daughter—and how to get her back.

  Leonidas swallowed and strode toward Alejandro. “Too much celery seed,” he said over his shoulder to Beck, “and way too much salt.”

  “Salt brings out flavors,” Beck called after him. “Not everyone’s tongue is as sensitive as yours.”

  Leonidas walked away at Alejandro’s shoulder, looking like a bodyguard towering beside him, his tall, broad, and muscled frame dwarfing Alejandro’s slighter form. Nobody jostled the doctor again as they crossed the concourse. Maybe Alisa should try harder to woo Leonidas over to her side, imperial touchiness or not.

  As she was gazing out toward the crowd, she caught sight of a familiar face and blinked in surprise. It wasn’t the man she had been expecting to come retrieve his cargo. The tall, lanky woman had tousled black hair and wore a blue snagor-hide Alliance flight jacket identical to the one in Alisa’s cabinet. With her height, she spotted Alisa over the heads of other people, smiled toothily, and offered a big wave.

  Even though Alisa had not expected to run into any former colleagues here, she returned the smile and the wave. Lieutenant Khazan had flown a Striker-18 in the same squadron as Alisa during the last year of the war—she’d even been at the Dustor battle where Alisa had crashed and ended up in the hospital. The unit had moved on, the ships doing mop up for the Alliance in the aftermath of the treaty signing, but Khazan had sent several messages of well wishes that Alisa had received after she had been removed from the regeneration tank.

  “What are you doing here, Captain?” Khazan asked, weaving through the crowd in front of the grill and saluting Alisa while giving Beck a curious glance.

  Alisa did not return the salute since she was not in the military anymore, instead, touching her palm to her chest, then raising it outward in a more typical civilian greeting. “I’m running cargo,” she said, not willing to get into any of the more detailed reasons that had brought her here with so many ears around. “What are you doing here?”

  “Got a few hours of shore leave. They’ve got hairy toad races on the port authority building’s mezzanine, you know. I do love to gamble.”

  “I remember that.”

  “I came in on the F
inal Impact,” Khazan said, pointing a thumb toward the other side of the station. “You must have seen our big warship in dock. I’m part of the fighter squadron there now.”

  Yes, Alisa had seen the big ship. There was a reason she had docked on the opposite side of the station. After the little kerfuffle she had participated in—and largely arranged—back on Perun, she wasn’t sure how the Alliance felt about her. She wouldn’t have been surprised if she had been denied permission to dock or even to learn there was an arrest order out for her. She and Leonidas might end up with matching warrants. Wouldn’t that be cozy?

  “Nice,” Alisa said. “Did it come with a promotion?”

  “It did. It’s Captain Khazan now, if you can believe it.”

  “If they gave Tomich a ship, anything is possible.”

  For the first time, Khazan’s easy smile faltered. “Er, yes. As long as I’m here…” She looked at Beck again, who was sneaking glances toward her. Khazan’s height intimidated some men, but she had high cheekbones and striking features that attracted most. “Could we talk in private for a moment, Marchenko?”

  “Private?” Beck asked. “Wouldn’t you ladies like some duck before you go?” He plucked a fresh skewer from the grill since all of the ones on the platter beside it had been taken by the crowd. He looked down and frowned when he saw that his stack of napkins had disappeared, but he poked around in the basket he’d brought everything out in. “I’ll even put it on a plate for you,” he said.

  “You civilians sure live the life of luxury, don’t you?” Khazan said, accepting the skewer before Beck found his plate.

  “There’s sauce too,” Alisa said, pointing toward a bottle balanced precariously on a corner of the grill. “You never saw the cooks on the Merciless put out sauce.”

  “No, but they did have those squeeze packages of ketchup, mustard, and ponzu. They were fun to play with during zero gravity drills.”

  “Fun to make a mess with, you mean.”

  “Cleaning the ceilings gave the privates something to do during down time.”

  Beck made a face, and Alisa recalled that he had been an enlisted soldier. His crush on Khazan might already be on the wane.

  Alisa was on the verge of telling Khazan that she could discuss whatever she wanted to bring up in front of Beck—she had a notion this might be a warning that there was, indeed, a warrant out for her. But she was still watching the crowd for her contact, and she spotted a dark figure lurking next to a support post at the other side of the concourse. Her stomach sank. She could not see the person’s face, thanks to a hood pulled low, but she recognized that black robe. Who wouldn’t? It was the Starseers’ favorite garb. Nobody wanted to be mistaken for a Starseer, so few wore it for simple fashion purposes. The figure gripped the end of a six-foot-long black staff, using it like a walking stick. The legends said Starseers used those staffs like weapons, having incorporated some of their technology or power to make them strong enough to deflect bullets and blazer bolts.

  The figure was not looking in her direction, but Alisa was immediately suspicious that her ship had acquired a spy. Maybe someone watching them because of Alejandro and his orb? If so, the word had gotten out quickly. The Nomad had only been in dock for an hour.

  “Marchenko?” Khazan asked. “Did you hear me?”

  Realizing she was staring at the Starseer, Alisa turned back to her old colleague. “Sorry, what?”

  A part of her was tempted to charge through the crowd and confront the robed figure, to ask him—if it was a him—if he knew anything about her daughter’s abduction. But the odds of that were unlikely. Her daughter had been kidnapped on Perun, all the way on the other side of the system, and this was probably some lackey who had been sent on a spy mission. She could have approached him, anyway, but Yumi had claimed she could take them to a hidden Starseer temple down on Arkadius and perhaps get them invited inside. Alisa would be more likely to get her answers there.

  “I asked if we could talk in private,” Khazan said. “And also if I have sauce on my nose.”

  “Your nose is fine,” Beck said.

  “Why, thank you.” Khazan winked at him. “Your chef flirts well, Marchenko.”

  “Actually, he’s my security officer.”

  Khazan looked at the slender wooden skewer Beck was threading through the next batch of meat. “He looks very dangerous.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Beck frowned.

  “Nothing.” Alisa put her hand on Khazan’s shoulder and nodded toward the airlock tube. “Yes, we can talk in my cabin. That way.” She pointed, indicating that Khazan should go first as she leaned close to Beck to whisper, “There’s someone in a Starseer robe on the far side of the concourse. Let me know if he does anything suspicious.”

  “Like what?” Beck scanned the crowd until he noticed the figure, then made a hasty circle over his heart, a superstitious gesture that those from the moons of Aldrin made to call the sun gods for protection. The early inhabitants had been certain the giant green spot on the gas planet looming in their sky had been emitting harmful gases as well as general bad mojo.

  “If he comes over to sample your duck and ask questions about me or the doctor, I’d consider that suspicious.”

  “Maybe he’ll just be unable to resist the aroma of my perfectly cooked meat, which is also, I might add, seasoned with the ideal amount of celery seed.”

  “I’m certain. Let me know if he comes for either reason.”

  Alisa jogged to catch up with Khazan in the cargo hold. She had walked around the stacks of crates taking up half the space and paused by the stairs. She was looking to the corner where Yumi Moon stood in a green, ankle-length dress and bright yellow boots while tossing dried corn into the makeshift chicken pen. Netting draped over the top kept the birds from flying out—sometimes.

  “That-a-girl, Isabel,” Yumi crooned. “But let Alcyone have some too.”

  “I can see why you got out of the army, Marchenko,” Khazan said. “The exotic allure of being a civilian freight operator couldn’t be resisted.”

  Yumi looked curiously at Khazan and gave Alisa a tentative wave. The chickens complained at this pause in their feeding. Alisa waved back, trying to combine an ignore-our-guest gesture in the mix before she led the way up the stairs.

  “I’d tell you about how my life has been a lot more exotic than I’d like of late,” Alisa said over her shoulder, “but I wouldn’t be surprised if you’ve already heard about that.”

  “I’ve heard some.”

  Khazan waited until they were seated in Alisa’s private cabin to expound. She plopped down at the fold-down desk sticking out from the wall, leaving Alisa to sit on the edge of the bed.

  “I would offer you a drink,” Alisa said, “but all I have is water. My operation just got started and isn’t that flush with tindarks yet.”

  “No? Ferrying chickens around doesn’t pay well?”

  “Actually, the chickens ride for free.”

  “You should have stayed in the army if that’s all the business savvy you have,” Khazan said.

  “I forgot how endearing your tongue is.”

  “I seem to recall we had matching tongues. And that they irritated Tomich to no end when they made him our squadron commander.”

  “This is true,” Alisa said, expecting the mention of Tomich to lead Khazan into sharing her news, since he had been the one to help the Nomad escape from a bunch of posturing Alliance and imperial ships a couple of weeks earlier.

  “I got a message from him a couple of days ago,” Khazan said, tapping a red and yellow earstar cupping the helix of her ear.

  Alisa thought she might command the device to share a holo vid, but she merely lowered her hand to her lap and kept speaking.

  “You might have trouble landing your freighter on Arkadius, at least if you’re going to a legitimate civilian or military space base.”

  Alisa doubted the Starseer temple would count as either, but she saw no reason to inform Khaza
n of her destination. Even if she had come here as a friend warning a friend, that did not mean she wouldn’t relay what she learned back to Tomich. He had been the commander for both of them, after all.

  “I’m a little surprised I was allowed to land here, honestly,” Alisa said, waving in the direction of the concourse.

  “Must have been someone sleeping in the port authority office.” Khazan sniffed. “Civilians.”

  Alisa smiled at the dig. The fact that Arkadius Gamma was a corporate-owned station rather than a military one was the reason she had chosen it. “Yes, we’re so inept, aren’t we?”

  “I hope you haven’t gotten soft enough for that word to apply to you.” Khazan’s face grew serious as she leaned forward, resting her elbows on the desk. “Listen, I don’t know what your business is here or on the planet, but if you’re still harboring fugitives, you better not linger for long. I hear both of them are hot commodities for the government.”

  “They’re not fugitives as far as I know,” Alisa said. Sure, Alejandro and Leonidas had been responsible for the shooting up of a library—and Alisa might have helped in that endeavor too—but that had been on Perun, the imperial planet. The Alliance shouldn’t care about that. Even that crime had been a matter of self-defense.

  “Whatever they are, the government wants them.”

  Them. When the Nomad had encountered the Alliance near Perun’s moon, it had been Leonidas they had been after. Somewhere along the way, they must have learned about Alejandro and his mysterious orb.

  “And it doesn’t look too good that you’re taxiing them around the system,” Khazan added.

  “They pay more than the chickens.”

  “This isn’t a joke, Marchenko—Alisa.” None of Khazan’s typical humor was in her eyes now. “Tomich said he was vague in his reports to his superiors, and implied you might have been a hostage on your own ship, but he wasn’t sure himself, and he’s afraid your status is about to go from Alliance war hero to imperial sympathizer, maybe worse. Arrest may be the least of your concerns if you’re captured.”

  Alisa sighed. “I’m not sympathizing with anyone. They just paid for rides, and I’m giving them rides. They’re getting off at Arkadius, and then I’m done with them.”