“I’ve just accepted a new assignment,” the captain said. “We’ll be flying to Icesphere—you’re aware of the world’s status?”
“A glacial planet on the edge of the habitable zone, it has two major continents Orenka and Malbak. Their respective governments have been warring off and on for generations over the ore and gems in the tunnels where the majority of the population dwells. In recent years, Orenka, the larger continent, has grown more aggressive, perhaps in response to particularly rich new veins discovered deep within Malbak’s land mass.”
“Yes, the war has been bloody these last two years, with space forces being brought in as well as ground troops. The Orenkans have decided to hire mercenaries in an attempt to finally finish off their enemies. The Death Rush Fleet.”
Gregor had expected to hear that they had been hired, but he quickly deduced the captain’s next words. “We are to fight against them.”
He held back a frown. Aside from the shuttles, Mandrake Company had a single ship, and it focused more often on smaller missions that might require a couple of squadrons of well-trained soldiers, rather than getting involved with planet-scale attacks or defenses. They had occasionally turned the tide in wars, but usually by stealth, kidnapping, and assassination rather than by confronting armies. Even Gregor’s piloting skills would be tested if he had to dodge an entire fleet.
“Ostensibly,” the captain added.
Ah, so there was more to it than first suggested. Not surprising. Mandrake wasn’t one to throw his people against an artillery line for no reason. Or even with a reason.
“The Albatross and I and most of the company will appear to engage Death Rush, but we’ll be providing a distraction for a pilot to pick up an important person from the space base orbiting the planet. Our pilot—you—will then deliver this person to a protected location on Malbak. Their own military won’t send a ship up, because they’re worried it would be watched and shot out of the air. Though the Malbakians hope to keep this all a secret, this passenger grew up on the planet and his return won’t be unexpected. The Orenkans will want to ensure he doesn’t arrive, even if it means risking pissing off the GalCon army.”
“Am I allowed to know who it is?” Gregor asked.
“Admiral Douglas Summers.”
Gregor sucked in a surprised breath. Summers was a legendary strategist. Thatcher had studied his mission briefs at the academy and read all of his publications in the intervening years, since so much of it applied to space flight. Summers had been a pilot himself before being recruited to the command track. Gregor had never thought to meet the man. When he had been in the fleet, he would have considered it a great honor. He would still consider it an honor, except… now he was a mercenary, not a respected GalCon officer. If the admiral knew that he had walked away from the fleet for this life, what would he think? That Gregor was a failure? A coward? No, he had resigned his commission while he had been on leave, not during the heat of battle. No one would think him a coward, but… to give up all he’d had for this, what would the admiral think?
“Will the mission be a problem?” The captain was watching his face.
Gregor didn’t know what his face had been doing, but he straightened in the chair and smoothed his features. “No, sir.”
“You can take some men along and another pilot, in case there’s trouble. The pick-up shouldn’t be problematic, but getting down to the planet and dropping Summers off may be challenging. We’ll take a look at the aerial deployment before I send you out, but you’ll probably need to go in at night and dodge some bogeys.”
“I understand, sir.”
“Good.” The captain pushed away from the wall but paused before leaving. “You get the new pilot trainee on board?”
“Yes, sir. She’ll need to be tested thoroughly to ensure she’ll meet company standards, but she went through the flight academy several years ago. She should be able to fly a combat shuttle and the Albatross, as well. That’s why I selected her.” Yes, it had nothing to do with the fact that he had known her and had once spent much time fantasizing about her saucy smirk and her alluring physical attributes. He swallowed, hoping Mandrake didn’t question him further on this topic. He would not care to lie, both because he respected the captain and wanted to deal honestly with him and because he was abysmal at lying.
“Calendula is the name?” the captain asked.
Gregor blinked, surprised he had remembered. He had glanced at the résumés Gregor had given him and waved in approval, but he had also said that selecting a new pilot was in Gregor’s hands. The captain had given the impression that he wouldn’t particularly care until someone had been selected, most likely because Gregor had already interviewed and dismissed seven prospects—amazing how many would-be pilots had such meager grasps of the academics of flight. One impertinent young man had even proclaimed that flying was like scratching an itch—he might not know what caused the itch, but he could always satisfy it. Gregor didn’t even know what that meant, but the man had been far too much of a bumpkin to trust at the helm.
“Yes, sir. Valerian Calendula. She had just made lieutenant when she left the fleet eight years ago, reason not stated in her discharge record.”
Mandrake snorted. “If she’s Grenavinian, I can guess. That’s the same time I left GalCon.”
His interest finally dawned on Gregor. Of course. The captain was Grenavinian and so were many of his original crew members, people who had formed the company with him. With the planet destroyed, people who could claim it as a homeland were rare, and though the captain wasn’t obvious about showing favoritism, it was well known that he wouldn’t take an assignment that pitted him against a Grenavinian, and he might more closely consider the résumé of someone from his planet. That was good. If Calendula performed satisfactorily and Gregor was able to recommend her, it meant the captain shouldn’t object to her placement in the company.
“Yes, sir. She is.”
Gregor thought the captain might say more, ask for special consideration for her or even a slackening of Gregor’s stringent standards, but he merely nodded and walked out. That was as it should be; if Calendula earned a spot, it would be hers, but not unless she earned it. And, just as the captain wasn’t going to let feelings about her heritage influence his decision, Gregor could not allow feelings about her to influence his.
* * *
The flight simulator goggles might have been fun under other circumstances—more private circumstances—but there were several other people on the bridge, and Val felt self-conscious. She sat at the auxiliary helm next to Lieutenant Sequoia—he was at the main helm, guiding the Albatross along the edge of an asteroid field—and both of their positions were front and center, banks of view screens and holographic displays surrounding them. The two weapons stations behind them were also occupied, with the young officers practicing slicing the edges off the asteroids with the ship’s big laser cannons. Commander Garland, the captain’s second-in-command, paced a textured metal walkway behind them all, going back and forth from the proximity monitors on one side to a sensor station on the other side.
The officers were busy with their own tasks, so it probably only seemed like everyone was staring at Val, but she felt silly wearing training goggles linked to the helm and pretending to fly the ship. Worse, the program was throwing everything from pirates to wrecks to irate grannies with canes at her, and she had a tendency to fling herself to the left and right, her body wanting to dodge the obstacles as much as her virtual spaceship did. After every “near miss,” she told herself not to react physically, but the next time laser fire blasted her view screen, her body ignored her mind and tried to fling her to safety, her heart racing as if it were real. Doubtlessly because it felt so real. Whoever had programmed the goggles had done a good job. Thatcher probably.
A clunk came from the side of the helm, and Val flinched, expecting another virtual pirate attack until she realized the sound had been real. She paused the simulation and pushed the gogg
les onto her forehead.
“Sorry,” a young blonde woman in coveralls said. She was kneeling beside one of the displays that hadn’t worked since Val had sat down that morning. “I didn’t mean to disturb you.”
The clunk must have come from the floating box of tools and diagnostic equipment that hovered near her shoulder, or maybe from the multitool in her hand. After her apologetic wave, she started unscrewing a panel.
“It’s all right.” Val wiped sweat from her brow, glad for an excuse to take a break. Her shoulders were as tense as if she had been in actual combat all morning. “Uh, you’re a mercenary?”
The woman couldn’t have been more than twenty, far too young for this job. She was a beauty, too, even with a smudge of grease smeared across her cheek. Val had only spotted two or three other women among the crew thus far, and they’d all had a weathered hardness about them that promised this hadn’t been their first career that involved slinging guns.
“No, not exactly. I’m Jamie.” The blonde wiped her hand and stuck it out. It was still grease-smeared, but Val shook it anyway. The girl seemed a lot friendlier than the women Val had encountered. “I’m a partner and employee of Microbacteriotherapy, Inc.,” Jamie said, “and we’re working with the mercenaries. Except I don’t have a lot to do right now, since I’m mostly the pilot for the company’s shuttle. I’ve been apprenticed to one of the engineers, and I’m learning about spaceship maintenance.” She waved her tool.
Another trainee, good. Val needn’t feel so isolated among the highly experienced and gruff crew. This was the kind of person she wished Commander Thatcher had thought to make her roommates with, not the burly glowering woman who had yet to say more than three words to Val. But then, maybe as a part owner of this Whatchamacallit Inc., Jamie rated her own room. Or maybe she slept on the company shuttle.
Val squinted as a thought occurred to her. “Your company’s shuttle, that wouldn’t be the pink one, would it?”
Jamie’s nose crinkled. “Yes, it’s a monstrosity, isn’t it?” She glanced at Sequoia. “The color, I mean. Not the shuttle itself. It’s fine.”
Sequoia smirked, though he didn’t take his eyes from his work—he was maneuvering the ship close to an asteroid the size of a mountain, which elicited excited whispers of anticipation from the men working the weapons.
“It’s… somewhat distracting.” Val decided not to mention that the sight of the pink craft, docked amid all those sleek gray shuttles bristling with weapons, had caused her to fumble her landing. She might have if Lieutenant Sequoia weren’t listening in, but she didn’t want to make excuses for her nervous docking.
“Ankari—that’s the majority owner of the company—is leasing it from the captain, and it has all of our fancy medical research equipment in it, so she wanted to make sure none of the mercenaries would be tempted to take it on a mission and get our stuff wrecked up.”
“It was a smart choice,” Sequoia said. “There’s no way I’d fly a pink anything. Although that tactic might not work as well if we get a female pilot.” He flicked a glance at Val, one she decided to find encouraging.
“Uh, no, I wouldn’t fly a pink shuttle, either.” Val still shuddered when she thought of the eighty-year-old Walrus-class freighter she had taken on an extremely plodding run from Paradise to Targos VII. She had promptly removed the fuzzy pink seat covers, but her contract had forbade her to paint over the pink-and-purple pinstriped wallpaper that covered every inch of the ship, from lavatory to engine room. During that three-month mission, Val had developed a serious aversion to pink and purple. “I’m surprised the captain allowed a leaseholder to make such a drastic change to his equipment.”
Sequoia snorted. “Leaseholder.”
Val was trying to puzzle out his comment when Jamie added, “They’re sharing a cabin.”
“Ah.” Val had yet to meet the captain, but everyone described him as gruff and forbidding. This Ankari must be a brave girl. “I suppose the promise of getting laid regularly can cause a man to make some dubious choices.”
A throat cleared behind Val, and she nearly fell out of her seat. Commander Thatcher loomed there, tall and lean, his hands clasped behind his back, his face impassive.
“Is there a problem with the training program?” he asked.
Lieutenant Sequoia also flinched at his commander’s appearance.
“No, sir,” Val said. “I paused it because I wasn’t certain if Jamie would need this station for her work.” Which was the truth, yet somehow sounded like an excuse when it came out of her mouth. She readjusted her goggles over her eyes, though she didn’t start the program again yet. She didn’t want to have those all-too-realistic asteroids and laser beams causing her to fling herself from her seat when Thatcher was looking on.
But he didn’t leave. He watched the displays and the holograms, perhaps observing the weapons practice.
“Sir, it’s several hours until the shift change,” Sequoia said in a casual tone, the tone one assumed when trying hard not to be obvious that one was trying to get rid of someone. “I’m keeping an eye on our pilot trainee. There’s no need for you to interrupt your sleep cycle.”
“I will download the results of the training program and determine whether Cadet Calendula is being suitably tested,” Thatcher said.
“Goody,” Val muttered as he walked toward the sensor station.
Thatcher turned back, and she winced, afraid he had heard her. Lipping off to one’s commander was never a good way to get a new job.
“Lieutenant,” Thatcher said, “when I was on the ladder coming up to the bridge, I felt the slight quiver of a gravitational pull exerting itself on the Albatross. I’m aware that you’re using this field as part of a training mission—” he extended a hand toward the officers at the weapons stations, “—but make sure you’re giving those asteroids enough leeway so the ship is unaffected by their mass.”
“Quiver?” Jamie mouthed. Her back was to Thatcher, so she could get away with rolling her eyes, something Val wouldn’t have minded doing, too, even if this criticism was directed toward someone else. If there had been a quiver, she hadn’t noticed it. There hadn’t been any close calls with the asteroids, not the real ones anyway. Her virtual asteroids were another matter.
“Yes, sir.” Sequoia managed to say it without sighing. He must be used to his commander’s anal rigidness by now. Val doubted she ever would be.
“I will also send you some force-gravity equations to work through, to ensure the formula is fresh in your mind.”
“But the computer—”
“Is not a replacement for a quick and educated mind,” Thatcher said.
This time Sequoia did sigh his, “Yes, sir.”
Val glanced back at Commander Garland, wondering what he thought of his stuffy colleague. But she caught Garland giving Thatcher a nod. Of course one of the senior officers would be enthusiastic about discipline and extra training. Just like the military. Val hadn’t expected so much dedication from mercenaries. She should have known what kind of place this was as soon as she first saw Thatcher standing in the shuttle bay.
With his reprimands delivered, Thatcher sat at one of the consoles, doubtlessly already at work on ways to make her virtual training even more harrowing.
3
Val walked down the corridor with her roommate, trying not to wince with every step, only a respectable every third or fourth step.
“Are you sure you don’t want to see a medic?” Sahara asked. “You’re limping.”
“Just an overused muscle.” All of Val’s muscles were overused. What kind of masochists did three hours of P.T. after a ten-hour work shift? When she had been eyeing the job requirements for a Mandrake Company pilot, she had dismissed the part about “remain fit to crew standards and engage in mandatory armed and unarmed combat training,” assuming she could handle it after she had endured the physical training that had been required at the academy. At the least, she had believed she wouldn’t be expected to attend those
drills until after she had officially been hired, but she had a feeling tonight’s workout had been as much a test as the hours she had spent working the helm with Lieutenant Sequoia.
“The other leg will be just as overused if you keep putting all of your weight on it like that.”
Val smiled—all right, it was more of an irritated baring of her teeth. “I’ll be fine in the morning.”
She had assumed a female roommate would be a boon here, someone who might share the crew gossip, give her warnings about which of the prepackaged foods to avoid, chat about the rigors of living on a ship dominated by males… Instead, she was sharing a cabin with Private Muscled and Tough. She was about as likely to chitchat about mundane things as Commander Thatcher was to dance naked through the corridors. Further, Sahara gave the impression that she was annoyed that she had been given a roommate. After only a day and night together, Val felt the same way. And she found the collection of knives and guns mounted on the walls disturbing.
As they neared their second-level cabin, one of the comm-patches Val had been given chimed from her pocket—she hadn’t yet affixed any of them to her clothing, figuring she should make sure she got the job first, a job she was having second and third thoughts about applying for. She fished it out and touched the sword-and-tree design in the center.
“Hello? I mean, this is Calendula.”
Sahara gave her a cool what-kind-of-idiot-doesn’t-answer-a-military-comm-properly look and strode into the cabin without a limp, or any indication that the long workout had hurt her. No, she had been busy hurting other people for the most part. During the wrestling portion of the evening, she had pummeled a few of the young men who had underestimated her on the combat mat. And some of the not-so-young men as well. The only entertaining part of the evening had been watching her challenge the captain to a match. A big muscular man of about forty, Captain Mandrake had been Crimson Ops before leaving the army, and he had a reputation for being able to kill people with a twitch of his fingers—and doing so often. He had smashed Sahara into the floor within the first three seconds of their bout, offered a tip, then smashed her again. Val had gotten the impression he had been going easy on her roommate.
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