Asher pulled himself into a seated position, back wedged against the hub’s uprights. The vertigo was edging away, but intense pressure wormed against his ears. A dull throb had formed behind his eyes. He swallowed against a wave of nausea.
Beyond the questionable safety of his spot, there was another exchange of plasma rounds and the Human ballistic weapons. A pinging ricochet against metal forced him to the floor. He cast about the ruined space as the volley continued overhead.
Nothing. No weapons. No other way out of the room.
A tense pause in fire from the Humans’ side of the room. The sounds of a metal ping followed by a muted beep. Full of curious dread, Asher glanced up from his position. A Human soldier rose, device in hand, prepared to throw. Ceric pivoted into view. He snapped off a round that struck the thrower’s bicep. The device bounced across the floor and rolled off to parts unknown.
Asher threw himself to the floor, curling into a knot.
The roar of energy was incredible. Heat licked the back of his neck. The massive body of the hub shifted, thrusting him like a rag doll into the opposite wall. Jagged metal chewed into his side as one of the uprights broke free.
The stillness that came next made him wonder if he’d lost his hearing. Then, the sounds of wet coughing. A ragged voice cursing.
Asher tried to uncurl his body and found he was wedged between the wall and the remains of the work hub. He pushed against the metal to his left. It fell away, granting him room to straighten onto his stomach. Pain lanced his flank. He pressed a hand there; it came away bloody in the uncertain light. He stifled a curse.
Forcing himself to focus, he examined the bent angles of his shelter. There.
The lower section of wall had been torn from the frame. He eased the flap of metal to the side and glimpsed the pipes and lines of a catwalk.
Gritting his teeth against the pain, Asher slipped through the newly made opening.
53
Ask her. Maybe I should have thought of that. Might have saved a lot of problems with Ix.
Rachel arched an eyebrow. Erelah staunchly denied having done her little parlor trick on She Ra the guard, but whatever she had said to her, it worked. Brilta ushered them out the door, close on their heels in the eerie quiet of the compound. They passed the corridor Rachel recognized that would take them to the medical bay. And kept moving.
“Where we going?” Rachel watched two guards sprint by in the direction of the landing field. They never gave them a second glance.
“Taking you to Ulrid,” Brilta answered. Her tone suggested surprise. “Tilley said you’d be safest there.”
Beside her, Erelah’s shoulders drew up slightly. Her brows knit with some strange form of apology. To be fair, she had solved the problem of getting out of their quarters. There was still the question of giving their babysitter the slip.
Rachel exhaled. “Oh. She did, huh?”
Then, realizing: “Safe from what?”
A sharp noise like the rhythmic mix of metal against metal chewed the air. Rachel startled. The sound came from overhead, like a warning siren.
“Move. Now. It’s lockdown. We’re being raided.” Brilta thrust at their backs. Dimly lit alcoves flashed by as they ran. Two more corridors. Cautious hope welled up in her. It was a straight shot to the landing field. If they could just make it to the lift. Certainly, they could outrun this giant woman. They had to try.
Rachel had not really thought that far ahead. She’d envisioned a sprint for the landing field. Erelah helping pilot one of those ships away. Flipping the bird out the window as this dirty little planet grew small in the portal. The details of how this all would happen were a problem.
Suddenly the giant’s fist seized her collar and her feet briefly lost contact with the floor. Rachel was propelled down a new passage and running in totally the wrong direction.
Shit.
They faced a new set of double doors. At their approach, they rolled open. Lights flicked on. Another elevator-thing, but definitely going the wrong way.
Do something. Think!
Rachel doubled over, bellowing in pain as she clutched her knee. She could have grimaced at the melodrama of it. But it forced Brilta to stop and release her grip.
“What.” Brilta sounded hurried, fearful.
“My knee,” Rachel gasped. She faked a fresh wave of pain. “It’s a spasm. It’s an…uh…old field hockey injury. I don’t think I can walk.”
She met Erelah’s stare. The green eyes widened.
Brilta moved behind her, snaking a hand beneath her legs, another over her shoulders. The woman was actually trying to lift her, a prospect that was horrifying under any circumstance.
“Oh!” Erelah yelled. “I wouldn’t do that!”
The guard froze. “We have to get to Ulrid.”
“Of course,” Erelah stammered. “But it might…um…make it worse.”
There was hope for the girl yet.
A volley of shouts echoed to them. They seemed to come from the same level, but it was impossible to determine the direction. The communication device perched on the guard’s arm erupted into life with some lights and muted beeps. Brilta’s hand went to her ear. The woman turned away to listen, bent over with concentration.
This was their chance.
Rachel vaulted up, nearly colliding with Erelah. She felt wind rush at her back as Brilta grabbed at her.
“Go. Run!” She shoved Erelah onward. Soon they were matching strides in a sprint back down the corridor.
Behind them, she could hear the guard’s heavy footfalls. Slow. Just like she looked.
As they took the corner, Rachel pulled ahead. Left! She grabbed the girl’s arm and pivoted her in the direction of the lift that went to the landing field. At their approach, the doors opened. Rachel crossed the threshold first, Erelah a tight second. She spun off the back wall, whirling. Brilta was not too far behind. Her plain face was ruddy with anger.
Frantic, Rachel regarded what she assumed to be the call buttons. Her heart flattened. There were like forty of them. Jesus. Quantum physics had to be easier! It was just a goddamn elevator.
She reached for a random button, just as Erelah slapped an oddly shaped toggle. The doors slid shut in Brilta’s hot angry face.
Rachel sank against the wall, hands planted on her knees.
“Where?” Erelah panted.
“Landing field.” She swallowed, trying to control her pounding heart.
Erelah nodded, reaching for a diamond-shaped depression. She stopped, biting her lip. “Asher.”
Pounding sounded on the other side of the door, followed by an angry bellow. Somewhere outside the walls of the lift, a new alarm wailed on.
“We’ll send a postcard.” Rachel pressed the button.
54
That’s a lot of blood.
Asher lifted his jacket. The seeping maroon made the fabric of his shirt sticky as he pried it away. The gash was worse than he’d imagined. His entire side was stiff. A deep insidious throb had settled there, sharpening if he flexed at the waist. At least it was the side of his non-dominant hand. His aim wouldn’t be compromised. Of course, actually having a weapon would be helpful to test that theory.
The catwalk thudded. The air rang with heavy footfalls. He pushed back into the shadows, watchful. Selto’s men sprinted by on the lower catwalk. He kept still as blood ran down his leg to pool inside his boot.
Getting to the landing field would be easy if he kept to the maintenance passages. The half-remembered route would have to do. The Humans were fanned out through most of the facility now, but he doubted they’d discovered this section yet. Their numbers were surprisingly low to take on a place of this size. It meant either they really believed themselves that good, or they had intelligence on the place. Betting money was on the latter. These had to be the same outfit that took on the Noble.
They were here for a female. Fifty-fifty odds on which one.
But it didn’t feel like a rescue. It was mor
e like an invasion.
Go. You got free. Get to the field. Find a ship and go.
He nodded to himself in the darkness. Best thing. Just go.
What was the girl now to him? A liability? A standing invitation to more trouble?
Go.
He stepped out onto the main part of the catwalk and his feet automatically headed in the direction of the suite, the last place he’d seen Erelah.
She’s done something to you. That’s the only explanation. Maybe it’s like an infection. Robs your mind.
Another fifty feet and he’d pass the junction that could loop him back to the field.
The junction passed.
You’re an imbecile. A genuine—
“Asshole, watch it! That’s my arm.”
Northway’s voice.
Asher cleared the junction and climbed down the short ladder to the level below. He landed with a slight bobble that freshened pain in his side. The shadows cast by the emergency lighting were thicker here, easier to hide in. Soon Northway staggered past, wedged between three of Ulrid’s men. Their direction told him their likely destination was the landing field. Getting her free of the escort would be nearly impossible. Considering how things had gone in Ulrid’s workroom, he wasn’t sure he wanted to.
He slid along the wall, counting heartbeats until he was certain they were past.
Then stepped out directly into the path of a Human soldier.
55
Well. I’m closer to the landing field anyway.
The thought hardly cheered Rachel. The moment the lift doors had parted, she and Erelah found themselves staring at four of Ulrid’s men.
We never had a chance.
Selto’s people separated them, corralling Rachel into something that resembled a mechanic’s bay, a sheltered area to the side of the wide-open field. Girders overhead supported a partially open roof that offered a view of the dull gray sky. Disused winches and cranes rusted quietly in the shadows. The alarm from the main complex was muffled by distance but still warbled away.
A giant beetle of a ship dominated the space. If she were an engineer or a pilot, she could figure out its purpose, but for now, it just made her nervous.
The ship’s engines cycled into life. The roar echoed in the canopied space. One of Selto’s men raced about its exterior, adjusting things in a very hurried manner.
“You guys fixin’ to go somewhere?”
No one answered, or even bothered to look at her. The two of them appeared to have gotten their asses handed to them. She watched as they helped a third man settle against a loading crate on the bay floor. Fresh blood seeped through the wide bandage wrapped around his torso. His pallid skin was glazed with sweat.
Telmac, a guard she recognized from the medical bay, strode up to her.
“What’d you do with Tilley?” she asked him.
“Shut it!” He grabbed her elbow and shoved her toward his badly injured comrade.
He thrust a soft-sided packet at her. She recognized the orange starburst, their symbol for medical supplies. A med kit.
“Help her.” Telmac shoved her once more. “She’s worth a hundred of those damn hard-labor skews.”
Her?
Rachel pushed back the heavy fabric hood to expose jagged mousy hair. Mallorid. Brilta.
Guilt plunged into her.
There was no movement of Brilta’s chest. Not breathing. Hands clammy, Rachel searched for a pulse. Nothing.
She settled sat back on her heels. Was this my fault? Jesus, shit. This wasn’t supposed to happen like this. “I can’t. She’s gone. Dead.”
Telmac wrenched her aside. “What? No.”
He shook his friend’s shoulder. Brilta’s body slumped sideways.
Face pinched with fury, Telmac grabbed her up with one fierce shake. “This is all because of you!”
“Northway is to be kept alive.” Ulrid Selto limped into the bay, leaning heavily on one of his guards. His once-majestic cloak was a blood-soaked mess. Burns ran down his left arm.
“What the hell happened to you?” Rachel maneuvered free of Telmac’s grip.
“Your people have come to demand your return,” Selto replied. One of his men offered a canteen to him. At first he refused it, but the younger soldier wordlessly pressed him to drink from it. Ultimately, he obliged.
She squinted at him. “Really?”
Fear tempered the elation.
A lot of good a rescue would be if I’m too dead to appreciate it.
“Though I am hard pressed to understand your level of importance.” He coughed.
“I’m not sure what to say to that.”
Her sarcasm failed to register with Selto. “You can begin by explaining what they will concede for your return.”
56
“Where are they taking Rachel?” Erelah demanded.
This went unanswered. The Guildsman shoved her inside the room as soon as there was space to clear the opening doorway.
She stumbled and caught herself against the counter. She did not recognize him. He was a short, swarthy man with dark hair. His eyes watched her every move.
Erelah backed into the common room, stepping down the sunken area. Instead of staying at the door, like Brilta, he followed.
“Sit down,” he snarled.
You’ve escaped a heavily fortified research carrier. On your own. Certainly, you can slip the confines of a barely maintained mining operation.
You know what you have to do.
Erelah swallowed, backing up until her calves hit the edge of the sofa. “I don’t want to hurt you. Just let me go.”
The guard greeted this with a fully amused laugh.
“Shall I beg for mercy?” His eyes were hungry. “You first.”
He shoved her back onto the cushions. She scrambled away, using the slick surface to propel her body off the sofa. Erelah rolled, but before she could get her feet under her, he was atop her. His weight crushed down on her back, trapping her arms beneath her. There was a purring sound of ripping fabric. Cold air met the exposed skin of her back.
Her struggles intensified. He had her pinned thoroughly, the side of her face pressed to the cold tiles.
Tyron’s memory surged forward, sticky with panic: Just like Stelvick. Just like—
There was a thick meaty sound of flesh against flesh. The guard’s horrible weight was suddenly absent. Erelah twisted, crabbing to the wall.
Asher stood over the sprawled body with a clumsy looking weapon in his hands. “He hurt you?”
Erelah shook her head.
He seemed so pale, wasted. His chest heaved, gasping. Sweat glazed his skin. Her eyes widened at the spreading patch of blood along his shirt.
“You came back.”
Asher lifted a shoulder. “Forgot my coat.”
57
Ohmygod. Ohmygod. Ohmygod.
Rachel gasped, hands splayed out by her sides, making nonsense patterns.
It all happened so fast.
One second Selto was yelling at the approaching soldiers standing three feet away from her. The next his head just…exploded in a violent red plume.
His blood speckled her face and hands. Oh Jesus. She moved to wipe it off.
“Hands on your head.” The command was in Common.
“Okay!” she shouted back at the approaching men. Red targeting lights danced across her face and chest.
She panted. Terror knotted her throat. “Look. My name’s Northway. I’m Human. I’ve been—”
“On your knees!”
It took her nearly a full minute to realize the command was in honest-to-God English.
“Kneel.”
“What?”
There was a very precise metallic sound. Like the safety being clicked off a weapon that made people’s heads explode. So Rachel knelt. The mud squelched beneath her knees.
“My name is Rachel Northway, I was on the UEC Agamemnon—”
“Quiet.”
The command was dismissive, brusque.
The soldier barking orders at her was barely more than twenty. Probably a colonial marine. Never saw Earth before the big rollout. Maybe in pictures. He was an adrenaline jock. The kind that would be just as happy shooting things or roughing up folks for beer money on any of the outer rim colonies. Well, if there were still outer rim colonies. Of course, he’d never heard of the Aggie. He was probably still in space marine kindergarten or whatever when her ship went lost.
“This is Adam 3 for TL.” He tapped his earwig.
“Go for TL.”
“No sign of the targets, but I’ve got a hostile here.” His emotionless face regarded her like a part of the terrain. “Speaks English. Says she’s Human.”
“Copy. Hold her. Might be a feral. Wren’s on his way. Over.”
Feral?
The marine walked around her and incredibly, she felt zip ties being slipped around her wrists. She tried to turn, but got a knee in her back. “Wait a sec. You don’t need to do that. I’m one of you.”
“Standard procedure.”
“You don’t know who I am.”
There was no answer. Only the impatient slop of his boots in the mud. Occasionally there were static-filled calls across his radio that only seemed to make his pacing more impatient-sounding. In the distance, there were pops of gunfire. He was probably upset he wasn’t out shooting aliens.
“O’Connell. Whatcha got?” More boots tromping from behind her.
“Says she’s Human. Named Norwhich—”
“Northway. My name is Rachel Northway.” She craned her neck to look over her shoulder.
“Those won’t be necessary.” This from in front of her.
The man striding toward her was too slight of frame to be anything but officer. It if weren’t for the garb, she would have pegged him for an accountant or a tax attorney or some equally boring and non-physical profession, not someone with the rank indicated by the insignia on his collar.
Then he actually talked to her, not at her. “I’m Captain Miles Wren of the United Earth Coalition.”
“Rachel Northway. Doctor. UEC Agamemnon.”
allies and enemies 02 - rogues Page 18
