Mandrake Company- The Complete Series

by Ruby Lionsdrake

  The information on Felgard came up, and she skimmed through it, trying to commit as much to memory as she could.

  Far too soon, the hiss of a door sliding open sounded behind her. Ankari kept reading, kept devouring information, until a hand landed on her shoulder. She held her open hands out and turned, expecting a security guard. But it was the captain. His hair was tousled, and he was wearing a rumpled short-sleeve sleep shirt. She stared down at the corded muscles of his forearm beneath black tattoos of leaves and thorns stretching from his wrists to his elbows, and belatedly realized she should have hunted around and found the syringe before leaving Striker. She could have jabbed him with a dose of sedative, or something more toxic if she could have found it. The bastard deserved it.

  Someone shifted in the doorway. Ah, there were the security guards. The syringe probably wouldn’t have mattered when there was backup so close.

  Ankari lifted her gaze to the captain’s eyes, wondering what she would see there. Irritation, most likely. Especially if he had been woken from sleep.

  “You seem to have left your date,” he said blandly.

  For reasons she could only guess at, he seemed more... amused than irritated. It flustered her. Perhaps because he wasn’t wearing all of his weapons—or his habitual glower—she had a hard time remembering that this was the man who had destroyed her ship. Or maybe it had something to do with the way that shirt so nicely hugged his form. Who had dreamily pointed out he was handsome? Jamie? It was true, especially without the glower.

  Ankari lifted her chin, determined not to acknowledge any attraction—and determined to stop looking at his nicely outlined pectoral muscles. “He had roaming hands. I find that unacceptable on a first date.”

  The captain snorted. “All right, woman. Back to your cell.” He took her elbow and pointed her toward the door. His grip wasn’t harsh, but it was firm. She would have to be content with the information she had gathered, because she wasn’t getting any more tonight.

  * * *

  Viktor yawned but kept his eyes focused on the video feedback from the brig. He wasn’t going back to bed until he figured out how his prisoner had acquired Dr. Zimonjic’s syringe. Viktor had been standing there, watching the women the whole time that medical treatment had been going on. He’d already scoured the footage from the corridor and, even though there weren’t recording devices in the ladders, had gotten the gist of what had happened in there from Strider’s outcries of rage, which a nearby camera had picked up. What had happened after, out in the corridor, had surprised him. Not the fact that Striker had been bested by a woman—Hazel often took him down on the wrestling mat, because he had a tendency to underestimate the fairer sex—but the fact that this scheming little entrepreneur knew mashatui, a martial art that had developed on the world of Spero. Spero had been destroyed—wiped clean of life and left a radioactive mess—twenty years ago, much as his own Grenavine had been annihilated. Both planets had been used as examples for the rest of the system, a blunt, terrifying, and devastating way to end rebellions that had been centuries in the making. Now everyone knew, those who defied GalCon suffered total eradication.

  Questioning his assessment, Viktor had played that short fight in the corridor countless times, watching the flowing style of her kicks and blocks. It was that flow that made the martial art unique and memorable. For centuries before the rebellion, Spero had been ruled by a pair of finance lords who had treated the populace like indentured servants, allowing little to no freedom. Among other things, they hadn’t been permitted to carry weapons, nor had they been allowed to study unarmed combat. The oppressed citizens, always planning for a day when they might overthrow their unwanted rulers, had practiced an ancient martial art on the sly, adapting it so it looked more like a dance than a style of combat, turning it into something their rulers wouldn’t recognize as a means of attack and defense, even if they were watching the katas being performed. There were precedents, some that dated back to Old Earth, but mashatui was the only living style of this type, as Viktor well knew; every unarmed combat system had been drilled into him during his military training. And even mashatui was barely considered “living.” Not when so few of Spero’s inhabitants remained.

  Markovich couldn’t have been more than a few years old when the planet was destroyed. Did this mean her family had left before the devastation? That a father or mother had trained her? Viktor hadn’t heard of the art being taught in schools.

  He rubbed his eyes and yawned again, not sure why he was expending so much mental effort on musing about her. She knew mashatui, and she might have been born on Spero. So, what? It didn’t change anything. She was still a criminal and still had to be delivered to Felgard, especially since Viktor had told Felgard he had her. If he hadn’t sent word so early, he might have...

  “Might have what?” he grumbled to himself. Let her go? Why? Because she might be from a world that had been destroyed? Because he was from a world that had been destroyed? It wasn’t as if they were even the same worlds. “Nothing in common; nothing that matters.”

  He waved at the holographic display above the desk to restart it. He hadn’t been paying attention, and Zimonjic was already walking out of the cell. This time, he watched more carefully, but it wasn’t until the third iteration that he spotted Markovich’s quick move, her lower hand subtly delving into the doctor’s pocket. On the video, he couldn’t even see what she had pulled out or where she had hidden it, but he had seen enough. She had deft fingers.

  A thief, a martial artist, and an entrepreneur. And a criminal. “Busy girl.”

  A chime sounded. His sleepy mind thought it was the door—he was expecting Striker, as soon as a nurse cleared him as fit for duty and he couldn’t hide out in sickbay any longer—but he realized it was just his comm. “What?”

  “It’s Thomlin, sir. I got into Markovich’s account and have the message you asked for.”

  “Good. Send it to me.” Viktor felt a little sheepish at prying into her personal mail, but he had to know whom she had contacted and why. For all he knew, she might be arranging some ambush for the Albatross, so she and her friends could slip away. He would certainly be trying something of that ilk.

  “Yes, sir.” Thomlin, his chief intel officer, didn’t sound that excited about the message, so it probably didn’t promise a nefarious threat to the ship.

  Viktor read it right away, anyway. Whether he wanted to admit it or not, this woman had piqued his curiosity. When he finished, he wondered if he should have read it after all. It could have been part of her on-going act—she must have suspected that someone on the ship would be talented enough to hack into her account and read her outgoing messages—but her plea for her friend to figure out why there was a bounty on her head made him shift his weight uncomfortably. He had already seen the research she had been doing in the rec room, first reading over her wanted poster, and then finding everything she could on Felgard. He was getting the unpleasant feeling that maybe, just maybe, she had been telling the truth, that the poster was a mistake or a fraud and that she wasn’t a criminal.

  “Just because she isn’t aware of her crime doesn’t mean she hasn’t committed one,” he told himself sturdily. Because to believe otherwise would mean he had captured her and destroyed her ship for no good reason at all.

  The door chimed. This time it was Striker.

  “Get in here,” Viktor said.

  Striker slouched inside, halting half a step inside the threshold, clearly not wanting to come farther. “Sir?” he asked warily.

  “You disobeyed my orders,” Viktor said softly, in what the crew recognized as his dangerous voice. Sometimes, at times like this, it was an affectation, but there were other times when he barely knew he was using it. That was when he was truly irritated. This was a mild inconvenience, an example needing to be set.

  “I know, sir. I thought... I mean, I didn’t think—”

  “No. No, you didn’t.”

  Striker hung his head.

/>   “You’ll take an extra shift for the next two weeks, during which you’ll run a diagnostic on every piece of battle armor for every crew member. I want each suit cleaned and polished, as well. You’ll be up at five a.m. every day, too, to teach the morning unarmed combat class. It seems you need a brush-up.”

  Striker winced. “I was drugged, sir. I couldn’t move as fast as usual.”

  The captain wasn’t all that sure that would have mattered, but he wouldn’t argue and humiliate the man further than he already was. “Yes, sir, is the expected response, nothing more,” he said, his tone cold and clipped.

  “Yes, sir.”

  All in all, it wasn’t much of a punishment, so Striker shouldn’t have reason for resentment. It was more of a warning. Viktor preferred not to dock men their pay or reduce their rank, since things like that were cause for resentment, but he couldn’t have prisoners roaming free about the ship.

  “One more thing before you start your extra duties,” Viktor said.

  “Yes?” A wary glance.

  “Find the women’s gear, check it for anything that might be used to facilitate an escape or overpower someone—” Viktor raised his brows with significance, “—and remove it. But give them the rest of their stuff. Their fecal samples and equipment for examining them, or whatever they have in there.”

  “All right... but why, sir?”

  Why, indeed? “Because I said so.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  4

  The morning brought two gifts: the team’s bags of equipment and three egg logs, the latter being the mercenary equivalent of breakfast. Nobody had offered them dinner the night before, so Ankari was hungry enough to rip open the wrapper of her “log” without scrutinizing the ingredients list. Some things were probably better left a mystery, anyway.

  “I don’t understand this,” Lauren said, standing over her open pack, “but I’m tickled to see my collapsible BioEye 973.” She pulled out a compact field unit that was a combination microscope and sensor unit. “My field generator is even in here.”

  Ankari opened her own pack and immediately noticed that the rope and rappelling kit had been removed, along with a multi-purpose knife and a laser cutting tool. All of the samples she had gathered were there. “Guess they assumed we couldn’t use fossilized remains to formulate an escape.”

  “I’ll take those,” Lauren said brightly, holding out her hand. She had already settled cross-legged on the floor and didn’t seem daunted by the notion of setting up a field lab in a tiny room with no tables, sinks, or power outlets.

  “It takes so little to make you happy.” Ankari laid the samples out beside her. “You were a good investment.”

  Lauren smiled. “Of course I was.”

  “Let me know if I can help with anything.”

  Lauren didn’t respond. She had already bored into one of the samples and scraped out fine particles to make her first slide, and she was busy with the microscope. The humming sensors doubtlessly told her more than eyes alone could.

  Ankari settled on the floor against the bench, sitting next to Jamie, who was inspecting the wrapper before opening her egg log.

  “Eat it,” Ankari suggested. “You’re already on the lanky side. You shouldn’t be missing meals. Not if you want to keep attracting the eye of sexy mercenaries.”

  “Uh. Which one was the sexy one, because I know you’re not talking about that thug from last night?”

  “You liked the captain, didn’t you? Though he is a little old for you.”

  Jamie snorted. “I’m not the one he watches when he comes down here.”

  “No, because you’re not the one who talks a lot and pickpockets his people.” Ankari bit into her breakfast and eyed the corner of the desk at the end of the corridor. The day guard didn’t throw his boots on it—maybe he considered himself more professional than the movie-watching night-shift man—but he was up there. He’d brought them the gear and food, then disappeared into the alcove. What could she try next to escape? At the least, she wanted a chance to read whatever message Fumio might have sent back. But preferably, she’d find a way for them to get off the ship altogether.

  “No doubt, that’s why you left with the thug last night and came back with him. You must have done something he appreciated.” Jamie waved to the packs.

  “I don’t know what, since I was knocking out his men and breaking into his computer system.” Ankari supposed logging onto the rec room computer wasn’t technically “breaking into” anything. And she’d only knocked out the one man... But her words earned her an admiring smile from Jamie.

  “You’re so brave. I would have been terrified of going off with that Striker. I was terrified.”

  “An understandable reaction. He was dangerous. I’m just too busy scheming to realize I’m in danger sometimes.”

  “Are you scheming now?” Jamie asked.

  “I’m—”

  The guard chose that moment to walk back to their cell. He didn’t say anything, but he watched Lauren for a moment. He was probably making sure they couldn’t blow anything up with the gear they had.

  “Morgen,” a voice said over his comm.

  He tapped the patch. “Here.”

  “Striker assigned you to his team for the scouting mission. When you get off shift, report to the staging room. You’ll be going down tonight.”

  “Good. Thanks.”

  “Going down where?” Ankari asked casually. Just out of curiosity, of course, not because she wanted to know if they were approaching a planet or station where three women might find a way to disappear if they were crafty enough to escape their captors...

  “Nowhere that has anything to do with you,” the guard said and walked back to his station.

  “Wanna bet?” Ankari muttered.

  “You are scheming,” Jamie whispered.

  “Always. Listen... do you think you could fly one of these mercenary shuttles if we managed to get aboard one?”

  Jamie’s face crinkled dubiously. “Maybe eventually, but probably not right away. I’d have to familiarize myself with everything first and find the technical manuals.”

  Something that she wouldn’t have time to do if they knocked out guards and blew their way into the shuttle bay. Not that Ankari could imagine a scenario in which that happened anyway.

  “I’m sorry.” Jamie poked at her knee. “If you had a real pilot, she would have gone through military or civilian flight school and would be familiar with a lot of the models out there.”

  A real pilot would have commanded a hefty salary and a big share of the company too. Jamie had been so eager to escape her home world that she probably would have worked for free. As it was, the five percent share she had accepted had thus far amounted to nothing, and she was working for free. Though she didn’t seem to mind, Ankari vowed to see her vision completed and her company worth something before the year was out. She eyed the confines of the brig. They just had to get past one small obstacle first...

  “You’re doing fine,” Ankari said. “And maybe I can get you a technical manual that you could study beforehand.”

  “Beforehand? What’s happening... after hand?”

  “We’re going wherever he’s going,” Ankari murmured, nodding toward the guard desk. She had no idea what this new mercenary mission might entail, but if there was going to be a preliminary scouting mission, there should be a full-fledged assault at some point after that. If most of the crew went along on that, that could be the perfect time to escape.

  “Tonight?”

  “Tonight or more likely tomorrow. We’ll get off the ship, disappear on the world or station or whatever we’re approaching, and leave our mercenary friends forever. And find somewhere safe to hide until we can get this bounty problem solved.” Ankari scooted up to Lauren, tapping her on the shoulder. “You know that generator you mentioned? Didn’t you once say that it could make electromagnetic pulses?”

  “That’s one of the energy forms it can generate, yes.”
>
  “And you said they left it in there?”

  “Yes.” Lauren tapped the pack—hers had always been the heaviest. “They took my nail file, but not an energy generator.”

  “Because it looks like scientific equipment, not a weapon.”

  “It is scientific equipment.”

  “I know, but is there any chance it could disrupt the force field?”

  “Uhhh.” Lauren gave the invisible shield a skeptical look. “Maybe with Jamie’s help, I could try to come up with... something. But I couldn’t make any promises.”

  “Do your best.” Even if the generator could free them from the brig, Ankari would still have to figure out a way to get into the shuttle bay, not to mention finding a manual for Jamie. Still, if the ship would soon be light on crew members, that would be the time to try an escape.

  “This is another instance when a technical manual would be useful,” Jamie said, waving toward the force field. “One of this ship, this time.”

  “The manuals for the ship and the shuttles are probably on the tablets the crew all have. I’ll see if I can get you one.” Ankari stood up, hoping the guard would respond if she called him back here.

  “How are you going to do that?” Jamie asked.

  “Chat with the captain.” Ankari wriggled her fingers to imply she might do a little more than chat.

  “Without the force field being involved?”

  Yes, picking pockets through that would be challenging.