by E. A. James
Watching them, the most notorious group of felons in the entire Galaxy, made Kira’s blood start to pump faster. She could feel her body tingle with adrenaline and her mind already working to read their surroundings, to find the safe zones, to plan their escape.
“Now, this is more like it,” she muttered to herself.
CHAPTER TWELVE
“It’s the best it’s going to get,” Vinnie said, wiping his hand on his pants and pushing himself up.
“Best we can do with a piece of shit,” the repair bot agreed.
Alaria laughed as she, too, pushed herself up off the ground. “Well, the shields are back up and operational, and the hull has been completely upgraded.”
"And it only took us a week," Vinnie replied. "It probably would have gone a lot faster if Bron had actually cared enough to help. Where is his fat ass anyway?"
Alaria gave him an almost scolding look as she worked to close up the panels covering the Curio’s extensive operating system. “He said he was working on better equipping the ship for battle,” she replied.
“He’s one stubborn son of a…” Vinnie started, but noting Alaria’s disapproving look, he stopped short. “He’s very stubborn. We agreed that our priority was working on the hull and shields, and he still has to go and work on weaponry.”
“Artanis let us take pretty much anything we needed,” Alaria reminded him. “It didn’t make sense to not take advantage of that and upgrade our offensive equipment a little.”
“He’s been out there all day, every day for the last week. Something tells me it’s more than a little upgrade.”
Alaria laughed and nodded in agreement. “I’m a little scared to see what he did,” she admitted.
“I’m not,” Vinnie said, attaching the final panel before marching toward the door.
Alaria followed behind him. Once they exited the engine room, Vinnie didn’t stop until he reached the exit. Waiting for the large doors to slide open, they couldn’t help but overhear the whir of a drill and the whine of metal grating against metal.
“Now I am more than a little scared,” Alaria said as they stepped out of the ship into the always hectic repair bay.
Together, they walked around to the front of the ship. The closer they got, the louder the sounds became. When they rounded the side of the Curio, Alaria gasped, stepping back quickly and blinking three times.
“What is that?” she asked, eyeing the object Bron had attached to the front of the ship.
Bron didn’t hear her question over the sound of the drill, nor did he even notice they had come outside. He was too busy hunched over his work, his eyes covered with protective goggles and his lips pursed with concentration.
The object he was working on continued to shock and concern Alaria, who, knowing she wasn’t going to get an answer to her question just yet began to walk around it.
The metal beam was at least ten feet thick and thirty feet long. She assumed it was collapsible, given that there were seams in the metal every four feet. At the end of the enormous metal beam was a point—a very sharp, very terrifying point.
“Hey!” Vinnie yelled, running up to Bron, not caring about breaking his focus. “Hey!”
Bron, looking up at them with an expression of surprise, turned off the drill and pushed himself to his feet. “What do you think?”
“What is it?” Alaria asked.
“A battering ram,” he replied matter-of-factly.
“A what?” Vinnie asked, clearly unimpressed by his guardian’s work.
“A battering ram,” Bron repeated. “I know it doesn’t look like much…”
“It looks like a lot,” Alaria cut him off.
“It looks like shit,” Vinnie added.
“It doesn’t look like much,” Bron continued, ignoring them. “But I think it’ll come in handy.”
“For what?” Vinnie and Alaria asked in unison.
Bron crossed his arms over his chest and spun around to stare at his work. “I don’t know exactly,” he admitted. “But, I found it lying around in the Arbiter’s scrap yard, and thought it would look really badass on the Curio.”
“It doesn’t look badass,” Vinnie replied. “It just looks bad.”
“I didn’t ask you,” Bron said, wiping his hand on his pants and walking over to Alaria.
“You probably should have asked someone before you installed this thing,” Vinnie replied. “Is this all you’ve been working on all week?”
“I upgraded the torpedoes and the turret guns,” Bron replied. “And I installed a new set of cannons in both the bow and the stern.”
“You’ve been busy,” Alaria said, patting him on the arm.
Bron laughed and shrugged, hoping to be as casual as possible. “Well, you were both doing so well with the shields and hull upgrades; I didn’t want to get in the way.”
“Are you just about done with this thing?” Vinnie asked.
“I am,” Bron replied, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a small cube.
When he pressed down on the only button on the top of the handheld device, the battering ram began to shake. Alaria gasped and stepped back, her eyes going wide as she watched the large beam fold up and disappear almost completely into the bow of the ship.
“See?” Bron said, smiling down at them with pride, “I told you it doesn’t look like much.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Vinnie muttered, heading back for the entrance to the ship.
Once they were back on board and gathered together in the ship’s common area, an awkward almost palpable silence fell between them. The space that was once the meeting place for their entire crew felt empty. The common area was usually filled with laughter and banter and fast-paced conversations. Now, though, it was silent.
“What do we do now?” Vinnie asked, looking back at them.
“We continue with our plan. We go to the Galactic Bazaar,” Alaria replied. “We find the plans for Jaantu 7, and find out a way to break my father and Kira and Thor out of there.”
“That sounds great and all,” Vinnie replied. “But, how are we going to get there? We don’t have a Captain.”
Bron grunted and then cleared his throat. “Are you forgetting whose ship this is?” he asked. “I built her, I can fly her.”
“I don’t know,” Vinnie said doubtfully. “What if we come across some pirates or something? You can fly, but you can’t fight. Not like Kira, at least.”
“Then we’ll take a less trafficked route out to the Bazaar,” Bron replied.
“That’ll take too long,” Alaria said. “We have already lost so much time upgrading the ship. They’re probably inside the prison by now. We have to get them out as soon as possible.”
The thought of her father locked up inside that awful place made Alaria’s stomach turn. Her heart sank every time she walked past his room aboard the Curio to find it empty. Even Zola’s company did little to make her feel better when she laid awake at night worrying about him.
“You’re right,” Bron agreed. “We’re just going to have to take our chances. If worse comes to worst, we fight. I may not be Captain Winter, but I have a few tricks of my own up my sleeves if need be.”
“Let’s just hope it doesn’t come to that,” Alaria said softly, slumping down onto the couch.
“Don’t get too comfortable there,” Bron said. “You’re going to be helping me in the flight deck.”
“Me?” Alaria asked, her eyes wide.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
The wobbly platform they were standing on was not Kira’s main concern. Even if it did give out, it would probably be for the best. Whatever angst she was feeling for action and adventure slowly evaporated as they waited for the rickety, old elevator to reach the top.
The longer she looked down, the more the reality of the situation set it: This wasn’t a situation she could fancy-fly her way out of. This wasn’t something that could be analyzed and attacked like an aerial assault. This was real—this was going to be her life.
“Maybe we should have spent more time on Rax’s ship planning,” Thor mumbled to her under his breath. “How the hell are we going to find anyone in that mob?”
She shrugged, her eyes still darting back and forth quickly, trying to take in as much of the scene as possible. She hadn’t thought of that. How would they find Aldo and Kardok? All she could think of was how they would maneuver their way through the mass of bodies without ending up in one of the countless brawls she saw taking place.
The sound of the elevator coming to a stop, which was really more like a loud, mechanical whine mixed in with the crunching of gears, made Kira grit her teeth. Before she even had the chance to turn around, one of the guards grabbed hold of her shoulder and pulled her into the small metal box. Thor was pushed in by another one of the guards, and Dario was nearly thrown in behind him. Just as the doors began to close, all three guards stepped back out onto the platform, their movements surprisingly briskly for their massive size.
“Good luck,” one of them said, the evil grin spread across his face the last thing Kira saw before the door slammed shut between them.
The elevator shook to life violently. So violently that Kira was nearly thrown back against the rusty metal wall. Thankfully, Thor with his accelerated reflexes reached out and pulled her back before she fell.
“Thank you,” she said, looking back at the rust-covered wall she nearly plummeted into. “You saved me from getting tetanus.”
“I think tetanus will be the least of your concerns,” Dario said, moving toward the front of the elevator, where the wall was nothing more than wire caging, through which every inch of The Pits could be seen.
An involuntary shiver slithered down Kira’s spine as she moved forward, noticing that each and every eye of each and every inmate was pointed in their direction. The closer they got to the ground level, the clearer the faces of their new housemates became, and not one of them looked pleasant.
“I take back what I said earlier. I would give anything to see an obnoxiously sweet smile right now,” Kira muttered.
Thor wrapped his arm around her shoulders and pulled her back to him. Turning her around to face him, he leaned in and looked her in the eye.
“We’re going to be fine,” he said softly.
“I’m not so sure about that,” she said, turning to look back over her shoulder.
“Kira,” he said firmly, drawing her gaze back to him. “You’ve faced much worse than those assholes out there.”
“Maybe,” she agreed, “but not all at once.”
“You took down an Arcanum soldier on your own,” he reminded her. “Not many people can say they’ve done that.”
“I didn’t take you down,” she replied, rolling her eyes.
“You scared the shit out of me, though,” he said, hugging her tightly.
Just as she spun around, the elevator came to an abrupt stop. Dario staggered backward and Kira reached out to balance him, Thor still holding onto her shoulders tightly. If it weren’t for that, both her and Dario would have gone crashing to the ground.
They all held their breath as the doors slid open. Although many of the inmates had lost interest in the newcomers, there was still a large number of them that had not. Kira felt their eyes burning into her as they made their way out of the safety of the metal box.
As they moved deeper into The Pits, Kira’s skin began to prickle with goosebumps. There was a tension in the air that she was pretty sure was a permanent part of the prison. The sound of voices and shouting all blended together, echoing off the high-reaching metal walls and blending together to form a long, constant droning.
“Don’t talk to anyone,” Thor said, leaning in and speaking to both Kira and Dario in a low, authoritative tone. “And stay close to me.”
Kira had intended on doing exactly that. At least, until she got familiar with her surroundings. Unarmed she felt vulnerable. Although she was skilled in hand-to-hand combat, she knew she wouldn’t stand a chance against a prison gang of Vorion thugs or Bandurian thieves. That meant that Thor was their best defense for the time being, and she was not about to put any distance between herself and him.
Getting from one end of The Pits to the other took a lot longer than she had imagined it would. Looking at the place from up above, it didn’t seem nearly as large as if felt when she was in the midst of the chaos.
It was organized chaos, though. There was a sort of system to the place. Just scanning her surroundings, she could see that there were different communities. The communities weren’t just broken up by species, either. They seemed to be divided up by pure brute strength. And, clearly, those with the most strength had the most power.
“It’s like there’s a caste system,” Dario said, eyeing the different groups with his critically analytical eye.
He was right. It was a caste system based on ruggedness and ability to instill pain in anyone who questioned said ruggedness. As they moved through the groups, they were each sized up. Kira could feel them judging her, jumping to quick conclusions based on her size. She didn’t mind that, though. It was better for her if they underestimated her. It gave her an edge—an advantage.
Besides, it wasn’t her that they showed the most interest in. It was Thor.
Even though his enhancements were biological, and not immediately noticeable upon first glance, he was still a very large, very muscular individual. Someone the others might think of either a threat or a potential ally.
She didn’t want him to be either of those things. And, she was pretty sure he felt the same way.
“Where do you think Aldo and Kardok would be among the groups?” Dario asked, his voice low, once they reached the back wall of The Pits.
Even though they were as far away from the center as possible, they were still surrounded. There was no place in the heart of the prison that wasn’t smack dab in the middle of one crowd or the other.
“There are thousands of prisoners in here,” Dario continued. “Finding them could take as long as doing sector by sector searches from Grimm would.”
Kira noted the desperation in his tone. She, too, was feeling overwhelmed. Her head hurt from the constant hum of voices and her stomach refused to stop flopping about nervously. Thor was the only one that didn’t seem completely out of sorts in the midst of the prison chaos.
“Well, we got a Rengar,” Thor said, scanning the crowd, “in here for smuggling. That means that he probably isn’t ranked among the ‘I-could-kill-you-with-my-glare’ group of meat heads over there.”
He gestured toward a group of Vorian warriors locked in an arm-wrestling match.
“But, both of them did work for Grimm, which means that they would have connections with other inmates locked up in here,” Thor continued, “so that means they wouldn’t be pushed down to fend for themselves with one of the weaker groups.”
“That eliminates two groups,” Dario said, “but there are at least twenty more that I can see just at a quick glance. There has to be a better way than just wandering around the prison aimlessly searching.”
“To be fair, if we were searching, our wandering wouldn’t be aimless. Our aim would be to find…” Kira started to point out but she quickly stopped when both Dario and Thor looked at her with slightly annoyed expressions on their faces.
“What? It’s true,” she mumbled, turning to look out at the mob.
“My guess is that they’re crafty,” Dario said, pulling the conversation back to focus. “This means they would probably be smart enough to not get involved in any of the groups exclusively—loyal to none, an enemy to none.”
“That’s true. We should start by speaking to anyone that isn’t part of a set community,” Kira said.
“It’s our best shot,” Thor agreed.
With that, the trio once again dove into the organized chaos of The Pits, making sure to steer clear of the most aggressive and territorial looking groups and searching, instead, for anyone that was confidently comfortable milling about on their own—c
ompletely unlike them.
“What about that guy over there?” Kira asked Thor, tapping on his shoulder and directing his gaze toward a brown fur-covered Rengar leaning against a pillar, calmly smoking a cigar on his own.
