Leto was silent.
“I'm sure you'll get to it. Any minute now.” Imogen's sarcasm was so heavy, Cam glanced at her, but it was more than that. She was furious, but not afraid.
By her attitude and her body language, she didn't expect any danger.
He opened his mouth, and she lifted a finger and pressed it against his lips.
“Can you cut the link for a bit?” she asked Oris, and the screen went blank.
“How right were they to think they could take you out?” she asked, looking up at the lens. “Leto seemed pretty certain.”
Cam had grasped hold of her arm before she could drop it, and he turned it over, rubbed his thumb along the incredibly smooth skin of her inner wrist.
He felt her pulse leap beneath his fingertip.
“More right than I'd have guessed, to be honest.” Oris sounded a little shaken. “If you hadn't suggested the takeover . . . I was overly optimistic about our chances before.”
Cam went still. “You're saying the Fitali have come up with something that might pierce your shields?” He knew they were perturbed by the reemergence of thinking systems, terrified of what would come of their presence after so long, but the Fitali must have had this technology in development long before Sazo burst onto the scene two months ago.
Which was worrying in itself.
If they hadn't had a thinking system threat to deal with, what had they planned to do with it?
And that brought him to . . . “You've taken them over?”
“Yes to both, Captain. Imogen thought the safest thing for us all was if I had control of their ship, and that was a fortunate suggestion, or we might in fact be in trouble.”
No wonder Imogen had been so calm.
“What I can't understand is why they'd want to kill us. Yes, they've been caught where they shouldn't be, but they have an excuse, and while uncomfortable, it would simply be a few awkward meetings at UC headquarters. To want to eliminate us altogether . . .” It didn't make sense. Leto was not unreasonable. In fact, Cam liked her, and found her one of the easier Fitalian captains to deal with.
“Hatred for thinking systems?” Oris said.
That was a possibility. “Did you tell them who was in control of this Class 5?” he asked Imogen.
She shook her head. “Although I'm guessing if Rose McKenzie is known to have freed Sazo and Bane, having me onboard made it likely from their perspective that I had done the same.”
Cam nodded. “But to shoot without asking first, that isn't like Leto. I've known her for years, and she's thoughtful and logical.”
“They are hailing us again. They don't know I've taken control of their systems. They think their problems are a result of being so close to Gu-gijeron.” Oris turned the screen back on. “We can see them, they can't see us until we want them to.”
Leto was shouting at someone, and another officer paced back and forth in the background.
“Do you speak Fitalian?” Imogen asked him, and Cam realized he still had her wrist in his grasp. He let it go reluctantly, and she watched him with serious eyes.
He shook his head. “Languages are not my strength. I speak some Tecran, better Bukarian.”
“They're arguing about how to proceed, and assume that because their systems don't work, ours don't either,” Oris said.
“Do we tell them the truth?”
Imogen shook her head. “Their faces aren't easy to read, but I could have sworn Leto was relieved when I told her that the grahudi was most likely dead.”
Cam nodded. “I agree. There is something very strange going on. The Fitali have been obsessively protective of the planet Huy for years, but they've taken it up to a whole new level with this. Breaking treaties, threatening to kill.”
“There must be something really interesting going on on Huy, then.” Imogen was watching Leto gesticulating on the screen and Cam took a moment to admire her profile as she tucked a strand of hair behind her ear; delicate and . . . beautiful.
“Do I reconnect?” Oris asked.
“Before you do, I just want to suggest you study the weapon they've developed to breach your shield and see if there is a way to counter it. Theirs might not be the only Fitalian battleship with that technology, and the other Class 5s could be in danger.”
“Again, you prove you are well worth the price of admission.” Oris sounded amused, although Cam had no idea what he meant. It was a joke between Oris and Imogen, and Cam realized with a start that they were friends.
The idea made him begin to relax for the first time.
Imogen had been right to kick him out earlier. Somehow, she had won Oris's trust, and that was infinitely better than the thinking system walling himself off from everyone, making decisions with no regard for anyone but himself.
“And the connection is live again . . . now.” Oris spoke through his earpiece this time, so the Fitali didn't hear him.
“Welcome back, Captain.” Cam forced a neutral expression onto his face. “It's a bit difficult to come back from a threat of murder, isn't it?”
He waited, watched the few emotions he could pick up cross Leto's face. Regret, again. Frustration.
“You knew we couldn't shoot.”
“We did, but you didn't.” He lifted a brow. “Where does that leave us?”
“I apologize. In my rush to defend the Fitalian reputation, I acted rashly. I will submit myself to a review panel for judgment when I return to the Horde.”
Leto looked like she was swallowing something large and spiky, the way her throat worked around the apology.
“Bullshit.” Imogen spoke in her own language so quietly, he barely heard her, and didn't understand what she said.
Leto focused on her, eyes narrowing as much as they could. “You have something to say, Imogen Peters?”
“Yes.” Imogen smiled in a baring of teeth. “What's to stop you trying to kill us as soon as we leave Gu-gijeron?”
“You have my word.”
Leto was unused to subterfuge, which fitted Cam's knowledge of her. And she was plainly lying.
“Of course.” Imogen smiled that non-smile again.
“What are your plans now?” Leto asked at last, as the silence stretched out between them.
“Your being here has changed things. We'll need to confer.”
That seemed to infuriate Leto.
Cam kept his face passive. “I'll hail you when we make our decision. I suggest you don't go anywhere.”
Leto reared back in affront at the order, and this time, Cam couldn't help his smile as the screen went black.
Imogen turned from the screen, and eyed him thoughtfully. “You do diplomatic doublespeak really well.”
“When I have to.” He took her hand, wanting to touch that smooth skin again.
She let him, her eyes on his thumb as it brushed along her wrist. He felt suddenly heavy, weighed down by desire, as if all around him the air had turned to syrup.
“I'm sorry to interrupt,” Oris said, although he didn't sound sorry, “but we have plans to make.”
“What happened to 'now I go to war'?” Imogen spoke the last phrase in a strange voice, like she was imitating someone, poking fun, but Cam had never heard Oris speak like that.
“'Now I go to war'?” Oris mimicked her exactly.
She tipped her head, amusement on her face. “Yes.”
“Well.” He actually laughed, the first time Cam had heard that from him. “I am going to war. But part of war is seeing what allies I have, and that means contacting one of the thinking systems. The three that are free seem loyal to each other, so any one will do, and that's why I've brought us close to Larga Ways. Of the three, speaking to Eazi is the easiest, because he isn't on a Class 5. He's taken over Larga Ways since the explosion, and it would be simple for you to enter the way station and make contact.”
“Simple?” Cam scoffed. “And you're assuming a lot, aren't you? That we'd do this for you?”
Imogen gave him an exasperated loo
k. “Yes, we'll be doing it for him. You want the Grih to have another Class 5 on their side, don't you?”
Cam didn't just want it, he'd been specifically ordered to get any thinking system on their side, by any means possible, by his commander-in-chief, Admiral Hoke. All senior officers had.
He sighed and gave a nod. “What are we going to do with the Fitali?”
“They're not going anywhere unless I allow it.”
“You can't stay hidden here, though. We won't be able to contact you once we leave if you're still behind Gu-gijeron.” Cam tapped the stock of his shockgun as he thought things through.
“When I've given you enough time to get to Larga Ways and make contact with Eazi, I'll get closer so you can link Eazi and I up. I'll have to bring the Fitali along.”
“Sounds simple,” Cam said, voice dry, and Oris laughed again.
Chapter 28
“What's Leto trying to do?” Imogen asked Oris as she and Cam passed the massive Fitalian Horde battleship in the two-person explorer Paxe had given them. She felt tiny and threatened; an ant scurrying past an elephant.
“Contrary to what she promised, she tried to shoot you. She couldn't see you on the scanners——even if your explorer didn't have excellent cloaking, the deritide would make it impossible——but they had a visual on you coming through the gel wall. She's had to make peace with the fact that her weapons really won't work, and so now she's ordered three small fighters to go after you.”
“Can you stop them?” Cam asked.
“Of course. They'll believe their fighters' power systems are too confused by the deritide to work, and they'll be perplexed and angry that your explorer's aren't.”
“Looks like we're nearly out of sight of you.” Imogen touched the screen, and sure enough Oris's Class 5 was disappearing from view as the explorer rounded the far side of the moon. “We'll lose contact any minute.”
“Successful trav——” Oris's voice cut off and in the abrupt silence, Imogen turned to face Cam.
“Alone at last.” He lifted a hand and brushed back a wayward strand of her hair. He was so close he was bumping shoulders with her in the confined space and she could see the light and dark rings of blue in his eyes.
She lowered her own, suddenly flustered. “You don't like Oris?”
He lifted his shoulders. “I'm warming to him. But he is a little omnipresent, isn't he?”
She considered it. “I'm not used to privacy. Not for the last two months, and the last two weeks, I was being held in a communal lounge. So . . .” She shook her head. “I didn't notice it as much as you probably did.”
When he didn't answer, she lifted her gaze again, saw he was staring at her. “You were held in a communal lounge?” His voice was a little deeper.
She shrugged. “There was nowhere else to keep me.”
He blew out a breath. “What were they doing?”
Again, she shrugged. “They didn't know themselves. They were waiting for someone to pick us up, or tell them what to do, and that instruction never came. Knowing what I do now, I'd guess the pick-up vessel was Paxe, and he'd slipped the reins.”
“Why didn't they send Oris, then?”
She grimaced. “Maybe because when they realized Paxe was off the leash, they needed Oris to keep watch on him, see what he was up to? What to do with me has to be a lot less important to them than recovering their Class 5.”
Cam tipped his head from side to side. “I'm not sure. You're pretty important.”
She laughed at that, but not with amusement. “You have to be kidding.”
“Even if they didn't yet know what Fiona Russell had done for Eazi, they knew what Rose had done to Sazo and Bane. It could be they decided putting the last Class 5 they had control of anywhere near you was too dangerous for them. But that aside, I'm sure they would have much preferred you to stay hidden under their control than floating aimlessly in Grihan airspace on a tiny runner for anyone to find. The abduction of Rose McKenzie is a huge mark against them. Now we know they took Fiona Russell and yourself, they are finished in the UC.”
“Maybe they've accepted that, and they don't care.” Imogen moved down to lie on the strap board and Cam slid down to join her.
“They care, but you're right, they may have accepted it, and are acting as if it's a foregone conclusion. It gives them license to break any treaty they want, because those treaties are about to be void anyway.” He was so much taller than her, his head above hers, and she shivered at the stark contrast of the warmth of his breath in her hair compared to the cool air of the explorer.
She angled herself closer to him, trying to soak up more of his body heat. “So they'll try to attack Grihan ships? Or attack Larga Ways? And what? Take Grihan territory?”
She didn't understand why she was so angry at the thought of that. Probably because she had a chance at a new future with the Grih, and once again, the Tecran were messing up her life.
“I think they'll try.” Cam was grim. “What are they doing otherwise? What other reason have Tecran High Command got to give their people for the loss of UC membership? We need to get word to Battle Center, and once we make contact with Eazi, hopefully that won't be a problem.”
“If we can make contact with Eazi.” After all, they were in an enemy explorer. “And we've got the added complication of the Fitali.”
“Yes.” Cam had taken her unsubtle hint and put his arm around her, pulling her closer into his delicious warmth, and she tried to burrow in. “I honestly don't know what's going on with them. I've always had a good relationship with Leto. This kind of aggression from the Fitali is unprecedented.”
She sighed, and let her body relax, tucking her head under his chin. “You don't think their grahudi is carrying some viral contagion, do you? That they've been cooking up some sort of bio-experiment on Huy, and the Tecran stealing the grahudi is going to blow the whole thing wide open?”
He chuckled. “Where did you come up with that?”
“The way Leto questioned me on exactly who had had contact with the grahudi. That was before you came back into the room.”
“That is interesting. And worrying.” He thought for a moment. “And not completely impossible. They are up to something that I can only assume is illegal, given their response. One animal is stolen from one of their planets and they send a battleship to get it back? And are willing not only to break treaties by crossing borders without permission, but have tried to kill us both a number of times. I'm a Battle Center officer and I represent the UC, and you're a key witness against the Tecran. However their actions appear, they can't be doing this lightly.”
The control panel above them let out a quiet trill, and Cam pulled himself back up, tapped at the screen.
“Looks like we've got a possible lift.” He slid back down to her. “A Grihan trader heading for Larga Ways. I've set the trajectory so we'll meet up with them in about an hour.”
That was their only real plan. They had to catch a ride to Larga Ways on a vessel that Eazi would allow in, and Oris had shown them how to shut down the explorer's beacon, so there would be no trace of its Tecran origins.
Whatever security was set up around the way station, neither Oris nor Cam thought a Tecran explorer would make it even close. The Battle Center patrols might take a chance bringing the explorer onside for questioning, or they might just shoot. And none of that factored in the information Cam had gotten from Barj, the Grihan mercenary on the Vanad's crew, that there were Tecran spies on the way station. Spies with access to explosives and other resources, who might still be watching for Imogen.
“What did you tell them?” She settled back into the comfortable position they'd been in before, reveling again in the close contact, the comfort of being held.
“That we'd gotten away from a Krik attack in an emergency capsule, which this explorer is small enough to be, but that our systems are damaged and we're barely limping along. Also that we're Grihan and if they could give us a ride to Larga Ways, we'd be gra
teful.”
“They believed you?” She guessed the explorer was tiny enough, the traders probably didn't expect them to be much of a threat. Although that might change if they got a look at Cam.
He exuded threat when he wanted to.
“They don't have a choice. It's a rule of travel. No one can leave a ship in distress.”
“It's like the rule of the sea on Earth,” she said, thinking about it. “You have to offer aid.”
“There is a big sea on Earth?” He smoothed back her hair in long, steady strokes, seemingly unable to stop touching it.
“Earth's mostly sea. The blue planet, we call it, because looking at it from space, it's all white clouds and blue oceans.”
“I'm sorry you were taken from your home.” He kept stroking, and she closed her eyes and swallowed back the tears his sympathy pricked to life.
“Is this normal for Grih?” When she spoke, her voice was softer than she meant it to be. Huskier.
“Is what normal?”
“We've known each other a couple of days, and here we are, all snuggled up and touchy-feely.”
His hand closed around her hair just at her nape and he tugged it gently, tipping her head back so they could look into each other's eyes. “Are you uncomfortable with this?”
His expression was hard to read, but she sensed distress and lifted a hand to his cheek, rubbed her thumb along the high arch of his cheekbone. “No. I'm loving it. I just wanted to know if this was common for you or just the strange circumstances we've ended up in.”
She felt him relax.
“No, I'm usually more reserved. But it's been an intense few days. I think we've saved each other's lives at least once each, taken fire together.” His grin was lopsided. “We're what Battle Center calls a bonded team.”
He let go of her hair, smoothed his hand down her back to the curve of her bottom, and pressed her close.
She'd felt the hard press of his erection brush against her stomach since he joined her again, but now it was wedged between them, and she squirmed as a shaft of desire and excitement speared through her.
Dark Minds (Class 5 Series Book 3) Page 21
