Smoke and Shadow

by Kelly Gay

  “There!”

  Rion zeroed in, flying Ace low to the ground and right over Ram’s head. She banked hard again and set Ace down ahead of him so that all the fleeing salvager had to do was run up the damn ramp. If he could. “Niko, Kip, do you have him?”

  Confirmation seemed to take forever.

  Another shot slammed the ridge beyond them. Ash rained down and the ship shook from the blast.

  “We got him! Go, go, go!”

  “Hold on!” Rion gave everything to thrusters and Ace shot into the sky. Once the ramp was closed and the airlock engaged, she activated shields. Then she banked the ship again. She wasn’t running. She wanted payback. Cade glanced over his shoulder. She met his gaze. “Bring the autocannons around and target that ship.”

  The Covenant war-freighter was too close to the Radiant Perception to drop a missile. Rion had every intention of coming back to Laconia and picking that destroyer apart. Damaging it now wasn’t in the cards.

  He nodded and turned back to weapons controls.

  The war-freighter was lifting off.

  “Three more ships!” Kip shouted. “What the hell?”

  “From the destroyer,” Rion said tightly. “They’re using Perception’s dropships.” Which meant they had a small army at their disposal. “Cade?”

  “Firing now. . . .”

  Ace screamed over the war-freighter as the cannons let loose, but a quick maneuver from the ship caused only minor damage to its wing. Enemy fire began to rain down on them.

  Damn it. Reluctantly, Rion pulled Ace up and headed for the stars.

  TWELVE

  * * *

  * * *

  Ace of Spades, 32,000 kilometers from Laconia

  Checking File Systems….. DONE...

  Checking Security…… DONE…

  >>>>>>>>>>>>>

  ONI FIELD PAD

  LOG IN: ********

  PASSWORD: *************

  >>>>>>>>>>>>

  Encryption Code: OCTWTF

  Clearance Level: H

  ACCESS GRANTED

  To: Hahn

  From: 67159-021127

  Location: Laconia / Procyon system

  Found: CPV-class heavy destroyer, Radiant Perception, crash-landed on the surface of Laconia. Mostly intact.

  Recovered: Log buoy dropped from UNSC Spirit of Fire.

  Current: . . .

  The cursor blinked as Kip paused and wondered what the hell he had gotten himself into.

  He’d just left the lounge after dinner with Niko and Lessa. They’d found not only the buoy but also saved the life of a well-known missing salvager. Rion and Cade had spent most of their time in the med bay providing medical attention. But dinner was a positive affair once they returned with news that Ram Chalva would make it. What followed was a rousing, good-natured debate, interesting conversations, laughter, even a few games of Alerian dice—courtesy of Lessa and Niko.

  And now Kip was selling everyone out.

  He was in over his head, something of which he was well aware. If he was honest with himself, he’d known it the moment Agent Hahn had approached him on Sedra eight months ago.

  After the terrorist attack there, with a bioweapon that had destroyed countless lives, he’d tried to go back to work and had lasted a few weeks, going through the motions, making reports on autopilot until it was too overwhelming to get up and go out anymore, until he had to face reality—the shattered and irreversible world he’d found himself in.

  And once reality had come calling, he hadn’t been able to go back to the way things were, instead falling into a deep depression that no amount of artificial means or grief counseling would help.

  Though Cade didn’t know it, he and Kip shared something in common. Kip had lost everyone too. His sister, his younger brother, his brother’s family—nieces and nephews . . . and Talia. Talia with her thick red hair and loud mouth. Talia with her crazy ideas and inexhaustible lust for life. Black had crept through her veins like a wave of spiders on the march, scattering, scurrying, dividing and laying down a pattern of inky webs. Black-patterned abdomen, six months along, and inside, black-patterned baby . . . The stuff of nightmares.

  He’d finally snapped.

  And proceeded to drink himself into a stupor on the floor of the baby’s room. A room his child would never see. The rocking chair his wife would never sit in. The books they’d never read there together.

  That room was broken now too, destroyed in his grief.

  He’d been enraged at his inability to help, or do a damn thing about anything. Sedra had gone through the war and come out the other side. They’d actually made it. And then to be subject to a terror attack by Sangheili Zealots that killed so many people? It wasn’t right. It wasn’t fair. And it ate away at him like the black poison that had killed his family.

  The chime at the door came, first one day, then two, then three, again and again, relentlessly until he rolled his body off the sofa, pulled his drunken self off the floor, and staggered to the door, throwing it wide.

  He couldn’t have been more confused at the sight of three identical men standing in the doorway. “Silas Kipley?” they asked.

  He blinked several times until three turned into two and finally two into one. He braced his hand on the doorframe and shook the fog from his brain. “Who’s asking?”

  “I’m Agent Hahn with the Office of Naval Intelligence. May I come in?”

  “Look, I already gave my report to the SCG. Everything is in there.” And even through his stupor, he remembered that he’d done one hell of a forensics job on that Bactrian-class tug, the one that had smuggled the raw material used to make the bioweapon that had killed his family. He’d been focused, determined, had been able to use his knowledge to do some good and ignore what he’d lost. At least for a little while. He went to shut the door, but Hahn’s hand shot out.

  “Mister Kipley, this isn’t about your report.” Hahn looked more businessman than ONI agent. He had a slight build, a kind face, and a balding head. His eyes went narrow and assessing as he took in Kip’s appearance. “Have any idea what day it is, Mister Kipley?”

  “Couldn’t care less. So if you don’t mind, I have a sofa calling my name.”

  He went to shut the door again, but Hahn stopped him. Again. Anger stirred in Kip’s gut, replacing the sour bite and bitterness that usually held sway. He went to tell the guy to get lost, but Hahn spoke first.

  “We can make it so what happened to you doesn’t happen to someone else, some other family, some other child. . . .”

  Before he even had a chance to recognize the emotion, it was there, stinging his throat and filling his eyes with tears. The bastard actually had the balls to bring his family, his child into this. Agent Hahn liked to take risks, apparently.

  “Do you want to make a difference, Silas?” The sincerity now in Hahn’s voice, the compassion in the man’s eyes, confused Kip. He hadn’t been able to answer. So Kip laughed like it didn’t matter, left the door open, and walked into the kitchen. “Beer?” he asked with more sarcasm than offer.

  “No, thank you.”

  Kip shrugged and got a bottle from the cold box; then he turned and parked his beer and his hands on the counter. “What about whiskey?” The agent’s cool demeanor got under his skin. Seeing Hahn standing there in his crisp suit and concerned gaze while Kip was drowning on the inside didn’t go over very well. “No? How ’bout some polly-sue or ace?”

  “How about a meal instead?”

  Kip had shrugged. He was out of polly-sue anyway—the polypseudomorphine had knocked him out for a few days and then he’d used all the prescribed ace. . . . He hadn’t eaten in . . . well, he couldn’t remember how long. Just the thought of food made his stomach clench violently with need.

  Before he knew it, he was seated in an eatery across the stre
et from his apartment, not quite sure how he’d gotten there. He half listened to Hahn’s proposal. Something about making a difference. Whatever.

  They’d targeted him because of his engineering background and because now he had nothing left. Goddamn vultures. They were hoping he had a vendetta.

  As much shit as Kip gave the man and his proposal, Hahn wasn’t off point. He wanted someone to pay.

  They’d talked about smugglers, about the postwar environment, about all the salvage and dangerous weapons drifting in space, just sitting on planets, in wreckage, waiting for the next terrorist to come along, recover it, and use it against innocent people.

  When Hahn told him that ONI had a job for him, that they wanted him to crew on one of the most noted salvage crews who ran the Via Casilina, he’d nearly choked.

  Agent Hahn was an excellent recruiter.

  The more Kip considered it, the more the idea appealed to him.

  Once back home and alone, he showered for the first time in . . . well, he couldn’t remember exactly. And as the water washed him clean, he realized he wanted out. Off Sedra. And away from the void that now defined his life.

  So he became an agent for the Office of Naval Intelligence.

  They’d set him up with a new background, switched his name from Silas Kipley to Kip Silas—easier for him to remember than an entirely new name, they said (and given his mental state he was pretty sure they made the right call there). They gave him a new home, a new life, and eventually a new job, crewing on the Ace of Spades.

  Who he once was no longer existed. That man was gone along with his family.

  And now he was floating in space, wondering what the hell he had gotten himself into.

  Rion Forge wasn’t a terrorist. He’d figured that out pretty quickly, though he understood why ONI had placed him on the Ace of Spades. She was good at finding things, whether expensive or controversial. There was so much Covenant scrap scattered across the galaxy that it was impossible for ONI or the military to collect it all. So they kept their ears open and used civilians as much as their own considerable resources.

  The heavy ordnance on the Roman Blue could have been used to kill innocents.

  ONI had been right to put him here. He wanted them to find this stuff before anyone else did, before millions of other people died.

  The cursor blinked at him from the small handheld pad ONI had issued. The scrambler was hidden in his quarters too. He had many gadgets that were a strange mix of human and alien. The tech was incredible, unlike anything Kip had seen. Niko might have found a tag, but it wasn’t ONI’s. Their tag remained hidden right where he’d placed it.

  He was a traitor in their midst.

  Kip had been invited and accepted into Rion’s ragtag family. Just one look at the lounge and the living quarters and anyone could tell this wasn’t some terrorist cell or fringe faction. Ace of Spades was a kick-ass ship, but she was also a well-loved home, decorated with mementos and objects found across the galaxy. And her crew was a tight band of oddball, risk-taking, adventure-seeking salvagers always out for a little danger and a good score.

  And it gave Kip pause because the information he was sending back could get someone killed.

  But then one or two was better than a million. . . .

  A deep, conflicted sigh breezed past Kip’s lips and he ran his hand down a scruffy cheek. Then he continued composing his message.

  THIRTEEN

  * * *

  * * *

  Ace of Spades, approaching Arcadia

  “Well, what do you think?”

  Niko stood at the table across from Rion and eyed the buoy device. It was, for lack of a better description, the size of Cade’s head, only rounder and not as sarcastic. Rion smiled at the thought.

  Niko gnawed on his lip, then turned the hunk of metal this way and that, checking the casing and what little visible components there were.

  “Well,” he finally answered, “the good news is it’s twenty-six years old, maybe more. UNSC stuff is hard to crack, but with this thing being technologically ancient, it shouldn’t be an issue. I don’t know the integrity of the chip inside or what kinds of encryption we’ll come up against, but again, it’s older tech and you’re in the presence of a genius, so we’ll probably get lucky. . . .”

  Rion squeezed his shoulder. “Get started then, genius. We’ll stay parked on Arcadia’s dark side until you figure it out. I’m going to check on Chalva.”

  It was a short walk back to the med bay. Before entering, she drew in a deep breath and tried to wipe the worry from her expression. She hadn’t wanted to alarm the crew, but Ram’s injuries were severe. At his bedside, she checked his monitors and then turned her attention to the man on the bed, wishing she could do more for him. Hell, that could be her lying there. Or Cade or Lessa. They’d all become targets.

  With each wound she’d cleaned earlier, her hatred for the Sangheili grew. They had clearly tortured him. There was evidence of plasma burns and cuts so deep and dirty they’d turned angry and festering.

  Still, the man struggled to hold on to consciousness. Even now, his eyelids were fluttering as though he knew she was there and was trying desperately to lift them.

  “I need to put you in cryo,” she told him gently. “We’ve done what we could, but you need a real doctor. . . .”

  He blinked rapidly, his eyes bloodshot when they finally opened and found her. Despite the load of painkillers she’d given him, his breathing was pained and erratic. He was hurting, bad. Things were broken inside. And he required more help than she could give him. Cryo could buy him time—weeks, months even. . . .

  He understood her words and nodded.

  “We’ll get you back to Venezia.”

  “Gek,” he said, then took time and effort to swallow.

  “Gek ‘Lhar. Yeah. I know,” she told him. “Don’t worry, he’ll get what’s coming to him—I promise you that.”

  “I’m tagged.” He grabbed her hand. “We’re all tagged. Be . . . care—”

  His grip went slack as he lost consciousness. Rion placed her hand on his chest, making a silent promise to set things right before calling Cade into the med bay to help transfer Ram to a cryo-chamber.

  * * *

  Niko worked for hours on the buoy, carefully taking it apart, the table strewn with tools. It was a slow process of dismantling one step at a time, and hoping the thing didn’t have some sort of combustible tamper device.

  Probably just loaded with encryptions.

  That he could handle. Exploding things, not so much.

  He’d seen enough violence on Aleria. Though, as glad as he was to be rid of that hot, dusty rock, without Aleria’s courier guilds and their smuggling efforts, he never would have been introduced to the technology he’d grown to love. With the courier guild’s slipspace-capable fleet of freighters, he’d been exposed at a young age to engines, support systems, FTL drives, and any bit of tech he could get his hands on and subsequently take apart . . . engines and FTL drives not included—he might have been young, but he didn’t have a death wish. Mess with the couriers and you got your ass handed to you. And sometimes you got it handed to you without doing anything wrong. Just depended on the day.

  There was a time when the courier guilds fought for all of Aleria. They’d risen against the might of the Mols’Desias mining union and justified violence on behalf of the population. Their smuggling had brought money and commerce and food into the markets and towns. But as time wore on and the guilds grew and split, it became less about the community and more about power.

  Unlike Lessa, Niko hadn’t been thrilled to leave it all behind. At first, he’d felt like he was just trading one gang for another. But it soon became apparent that Rion and Cade and Tesh—oh, how Niko missed giving that surly old engineer a hard time—were nothing like the guilders on Aleria. Tesh was simply too old to do any d
amage, though he made a lot of empty threats, and while Rion and Cade were definitely capable of raising hell, they saved that stuff for people who deserved it.

  He genuinely liked Rion. He appreciated her blunt demeanor, dry humor, and ability to wield a blade. Honestly, she’d scared the shit out of him when she fought for him to be released from the guild. They didn’t take kindly to would-be heroes coming in and saving their whipping boys and scapegoats.

  It had happened so fast. A blur of him getting caught hacking her, her subsequent interrogation of him and Lessa . . . and when one of the couriers came upon them in the market, they’d had a little heart-to-heart on what was going to happen—namely, Rion taking them off world, courier guild be damned.

  Needless to say, after it all went down, they left in a big hurry. Not that it mattered; they wouldn’t be going back anytime soon.

  Niko couldn’t quite figure out Rion and Cade’s deal though. Sometimes on, sometimes off. And without the drama that one would expect from such an arrangement. But, hey, if it worked . . . Niko was learning real quick that things got lonely in space. Odd arrangements were the norm for travelers like him. Going into port was like a holiday every time. Of course, he went right to wherever the ladies hung out. Sometimes he got lucky, sometimes he struck out, and sometimes he simply made connections. There were a few girls he kept in touch with in New Tyne. . . .

  The casing he was working on suddenly popped free. “Aha. Gotcha.”

  He resisted the urge to pull the guts from the buoy, instead looking for any small charges that might fry the chip. Rion would kill him if he screwed up now, after all the effort and risk that had gone into finding this thing in the first place.

  His hands shook a little at the thought, sweat immediately beading his forehead. Why the hell did she always give him the hard jobs? It was like he was holding her heart in his hands. . . . “Yeah, no pressure,” he muttered to himself, hoping the UNSC had opted out of self-destruct and had thought ahead to situations where the intel needed to be read quickly without the necessary codes being readily available in a wartime scenarios.