Mandrake Company- The Complete Series

by Ruby Lionsdrake

  She stumbled to a stop, barely noticing the travelers hustling down the space-station concourse all around her, many jostling her. Her gaze was riveted to the airlock loading area. Chanda had never seen so many hulking men together in one place. Hulking rough men. Scars marked their faces, daggers and guns hung on their utility belts, and tattoos sheathed the bare muscled arms hefting crates to carry into the airlock tube leading to a docked ship.

  They all looked like they could be the thuggish henchmen of Lord Blood Scythe in Demon Crushers, ready to slay adventurers foolish enough to challenge the boss without stardust weapons. Chanda had already been nervous about her planned deception. Now, she wiped her hands on her skirt and contemplated a hasty retreat.

  But no. She’d traveled a week to get here. She couldn’t turn back now.

  Besides, she might be worrying for nothing. Maybe she had the wrong airlock.

  She dug her pocket tablet out and flicked on the holographic display, a map and an address floating within. Airlock 73. This was the right place.

  Could these brutish men all work for Ankari Markovich, the CEO and owner of Microbacteriotherapy, Inc.? And if so, doing what? Were they security? Longshoremen?

  A man with muscled arms the size of Grenavinian Oaks hefted a massive crate.

  She quirked an eyebrow. Sex workers?

  Chanda snorted, hardly able to imagine inviting any of the brutes into her bedroom. Not that men with arms like that usually stampeded over each other in their eagerness to ask her on dates. Besides, Microbacteriotherapy, Inc. was a medical research and procedures company, not a brothel-management outfit. A medical procedures company that had grown from nothing in an amazingly swift time and was reputed to have reached astronomical profits in mere months.

  She sighed longingly and whispered, “Please teach me the ways, Lady Ankari.”

  Another passerby jostled Chanda again, nearly knocking her float-case from her hand. She stepped away from the moving sidewalks and walkway. She had to find Ankari before she could ask the woman for a favor. And technically, she wasn’t here to ask for a favor. Not at first. She was here to ask for a job.

  “If only they expected me,” she muttered and moved warily toward the airlock.

  Chanda looked past the big men and toward the porthole behind them, wondering anew if she had somehow gotten the wrong airlock number. Recorded it incorrectly, perhaps? The employee she’d been in contact with, the scientist who’d hired her—sort of—had mentioned a pink spacecraft full of medical equipment, not a gray falcon-shaped warship full of… whatever these people were.

  Chanda’s father had been a GalCon fleet officer when she’d been young, and she remembered loud-talking muscular soldiers occasionally coming to their apartment, but they’d been clean-cut, tidily dressed, and polite to her and her mother. These men didn’t look like soldiers, at least not fleet soldiers. And that definitely wasn’t a fleet spaceship outside the porthole. The dark vessel bristled weapons like a Hankrovan Porcupine bristled quills.

  As Chanda approached, she searched for women in white lab coats. She soon had to halt and jerk back to get out of the path of a man hurrying toward the others, carrying a crate too large to see over. What were the odds of reaching the airlock without being trampled?

  Her shoulders bumped into something so hard and solid that she thought it a support post. Until she turned and stared up into the chiseled face of one of the men, this one carrying a pack over his shoulder instead of a crate.

  He stood almost a foot taller than she, his bare arms covered with vine and thorn tattoos. Not the daggers, crossed swords, and skulls that some of the men favored for their arm decorations, but he still appeared about as friendly as a sniper rifle. When he looked down at her with cool green eyes that stood out in his bronze-skinned face, she skittered back, feeling like she had strolled into a minefield. Or maybe he had. At the least, his nose had been broken numerous times, and a scar had gouged a chunk out of his jaw. He could have been anywhere from thirty to forty, but somehow, his eyes seemed even older. Tireder.

  “Looking for someone?” he asked, his voice deep and gruff.

  “Yes, uhm, sir.” Chanda had never spent a day in the military herself, but it seemed wise to tack on the word when talking to someone who could crush her with one of those muscled arms. “I’m supposed to meet Ankari Markovich.”

  “Over there.” He grunted and pointed his chin toward a stack of crates that stood taller than a person.

  Chanda hadn’t expected an affirmative response. Was Ms. Markovich—not truly Lady Markovich, not yet—with these people? It seemed so unlikely.

  “What’s this, Doc?” another hulking man asked, coming up to stand beside the one with the vine tattoos.

  Broken Nose was a doctor? That seemed unlikely. He looked about as doctorly as a bridge troll from Castle Quest, and Chanda couldn’t imagine wanting him to give her an exam. She imagined he broke far more bones than he repaired.

  The newcomer had spiky hair and wore a chain collar. Definitely like one of Lord Blood Scythe’s henchmen. One corner of his mouth quirked up as he gave Chanda a long speculative head-to-toe look with his gaze lingering on her chest.

  “You find a willing woman for us, Doc?” he asked. “Not that she has to be that willing. Bit of a fight makes things exciting.” The other corner of his mouth lifted as his gaze remained on her chest.

  Chanda’s cheeks heated, horrified by the words—she wasn’t at all sure that he was joking—and her instincts screamed for her to run. She wasn’t even wearing anything sexy, at least she didn’t think so. Her black T-shirt—which bore the logo for Nature’s Wrath, the network game she had been designing, programming, and promoting since long before she graduated from college—fit well, hugging the curve of her breasts, but it wasn’t as if the neckline dipped down and showed any skin.

  “Us?” the man—the doctor?—asked, eyeing the spiky-haired newcomer through slitted eyes.

  “Sure, Doc. I’ll let you share if you’re interested in forgetting your celibacy this week. I’m not a prude. Maybe I could teach you a few things. Get you interested in sexing up women again.”

  “Wouldn’t that be fun.” The doctor looked at Chanda’s chest—or maybe the logo on her T-shirt, given this supposed celibacy—and looked like he wanted to say more. But he glanced at Spiky Hair and dropped it. He turned his head toward the stack of crates and called, “Markovich. You have company.”

  A brown-haired woman stepped into view, and relief mingled with panic for Chanda. This was it. The reason she had traveled this far. She hoped it wouldn’t be for naught.

  The woman—Ankari—smiled and waved as she walked over, though she gave the spiky-haired man a frown. “You’re not harassing anyone out here, are you, Striker?”

  “Not yet. I was assessing how amenable she is and if she’s turned on by all the sexy maleness out here.” Spiky Hair—Striker?—rubbed one of his pectoral muscles through his shirt.

  “She’s not.” Ankari drew Chanda several steps away from the men.

  The doctor watched them walk away, still looking like he had something else he wanted to say. Not that he’d decided Striker’s dubious offer had some appeal, Chanda hoped.

  “Hi,” Ankari said, stopping near the porthole, “are you here about our services?”

  Another woman came into view, one with dark hair and the white lab coat Chanda had expected. She paced back and forth while tapping in the air at the display over her tablet. This had to be the scientist who had hired Chanda sight unseen. Dr. Lauren Keys. Her picture was on the company’s network site.

  “Services?” Chanda tried to put a confused note in her voice, though she knew exactly why Ankari wouldn’t recognize her. “I’m Chanda Malhotra. Your company paid for my fare to the space station and said I was all but hired.”

  Technically, they had believed they were hiring her mother, also named Chanda Malhotra, but weren’t a few mistakes and misunderstandings typical when communicating from across t
he system?

  Ankari blinked and looked Chanda up and down. “I… Uh-oh.” She turned toward the other woman. “Lauren? We may have a problem.”

  The dark-haired woman flattened her lips together and walked over. “Aside from the fact that my delivery of lab rats is extremely late?”

  “Aside from that, yes. This woman says she’s Chanda Malhotra. Is she… who you were expecting? She’s rather young for the person you described to me with all the medical degrees and judo championship medals.”

  Chanda scratched her head, amping up her apparent confusion. “That sounds like my mother. We have the same name.”

  “Oh dear.” Dr. Keys stared at her. “I may have made a mistake.” Her brow furrowed as if she struggled to believe it.

  Yes, Chanda had been responsible for that “mistake.” She had been working as a part-time assistant for her mother, making a few aurums to pay the bills while she tried to figure out how to make her game profitable, and had siphoned the message off to her own inbox. Her mother didn’t even know where Chanda was right now, other than that she had gone out for a job interview. Mother had been so delighted, she hadn’t asked for details. She’d even provided a travel stipend. Sometimes, Chanda felt like she was fifteen rather than twenty-five, but that was what she got for pursuing her passion instead of a normal, paying job.

  Mother didn’t understand what Nature’s Wrath meant to Chanda, or the fact that it had already exploded into a huge game with millions of subscribers. Eventually, Chanda would figure out how to make it profitable. She just needed a mentor, an expert at marketing and monetizing intellectual property.

  “You didn’t use video as part of the interview?” Ankari asked, having no idea that Chanda had selected her as just such a mentor—after reading that employment invitation to her mother and looking up Ankari and her company.

  “Not when we’ve been stuck orbiting the outer planets for the last month.” Keys frowned through the porthole at the winged spaceship, the name Albatross now visible on its hull.

  “I have a botany degree and experience in programming,” Chanda said, prepared to sell herself. She hadn’t anything near her mother’s experience, but she was here, and she hoped they were desperate. “I’m certain I can assist you in some manner.”

  “Botany?” Keys asked. “That’s not the kind of flora we’re working with.” She tapped her stomach—her gut, presumably.

  Chanda had spent the travel week reading up on the company and understood the gist of the microbiota transplants they did, but she wouldn’t pretend she could help with research and development. But surely she had some skills that could be of use to them.

  “I’m a fast learner. What do you need help with? I’m sure I can be useful.” Chanda smiled, not at Keys, but at Ankari. From what she’d read, Ankari owned the majority of the corporation.

  One of the men whistled in their direction as he walked into the airlock tube, pulling a hover pallet full of food, if the boxes labeled such things as “egg log” and “ham and cheese log” deserved that designation. He eyed Chanda’s butt, then called, “New meat!” to someone ahead of him.

  “I fear he’s not talking about the logs,” Keys said with a sigh.

  “No.” Ankari pushed a lock of hair behind her ear. “Uhm, Ms. Malhotra. While I’m sure you have some skills that would be useful—”

  “Like what?” Keys interrupted.

  Ankari waved her to silence and continued, “It was actually your mother’s judo experience that sealed the deal, as they say. Also her age. You’re young and attractive, which could be problematic, as we work out of this mercenary ship. The crew is…”

  “You think she’s into threesomes?” a man whispered loudly—that spiky-haired Striker again—as he and another man carried crates into the airlock.

  “Rough,” Ankari said.

  “They’re savage troglodytes with the manners of drooling dogs,” Keys said.

  “Some of them are all right,” Ankari said, “but it’s useful if you can take care of yourself.”

  Ankari pointedly eyed the lack of weapons on Chanda’s belt, making no comment at the sparkly green trinkets dangling from it—they were neo-druidic symbols used in her game that she’d had made for promotional purposes. She may also have eyed Chanda’s slender arms, arms devoid of sizable muscles and also tattoos or anything else fierce. What did she expect from someone who spent sixteen hours a day writing code?

  Chanda, remembering Ankari hadn’t expected a programmer at all, kept that thought to herself.

  “I’m good at staying holed up in my room—or work cubicle—and out of trouble,” Chanda said. “I don’t typically put myself into situations where I’m forced to pummel people to escape. Uhm, pardon my nosiness,” she added, hoping to deflect attention from herself and skills she lacked, “but why is a medical business stationed on a mercenary ship? The information I was sent mentioned a pink spacecraft.”

  “It’s actually a pink shuttle that resides inside the Albatross,” Ankari said. “And is leased from the captain. As to why the business is based on his ship, the mercenaries—Mandrake Company, to be specific—are partial owners.”

  “Also, Ankari sleeps with the captain,” Keys put in.

  Ankari’s cheeks colored slightly. “You sleep with the tracker.”

  “Something that has little to do with our company being based out of their ship.”

  “Maybe not, but you’d find it inconvenient for your nocturnal activities if we left.”

  Keys sniffed. “I do not require frequent sexual stimulus. Our relationship is intellectual in nature and can continue over distance. Ready availability of a penis makes little difference to me.”

  Ankari rubbed her face and looked back at Chanda. “It’s a long story.”

  Chanda didn’t know what to say to the talk of love lives—or, uh, penis usage. She just knew that Ankari had the knowledge she needed about how to grow a company and make it profitable, and working for her would be the perfect way to establish a rapport, and turn her into—Chanda hoped—a willing mentor. She had left Li and Tate in charge of programming the new expansion, so she could devote herself fully to learning what she could in the next few months. As long as Ankari took her on….

  “I’m willing to take my chances with your mercenaries. I’ve come all this way and—”

  A throat cleared nearby. It sounded like a man’s voice, but it was a wheeled robot that rolled up with a large box with holes in it. Air holes?

  “Delivery for Dr. Lauren Keys at Airlock 73,” the robot said, lowering the box to the ground. It came up to Chanda’s chest.

  “How many lab rats did you order?” Ankari eyed the substantial box.

  “Sign here, please.” The robot rolled up to Lauren and a screen built into its metal chest displayed a few lines of text and a spot for a signature.

  “I need to inspect them first,” Lauren said.

  A roar from the concourse made Chanda jump. A man strode toward the airlock adjacent to theirs while gripping the leashes of two white tigers. One looked over, licking its jowls as it focused on the box. It tried to veer toward it, but the man barked a command in a language Chanda didn’t recognize.

  “Maybe this isn’t the place to open a box full of rats,” Ankari said dryly.

  “Ladies,” came a voice from the airlock tube. A man in a duster stuck his head out, his dark gray-speckled hair cut close and his face shaven—he looked less disreputable than the others, but had shoulders as broad as those of any of the other men there. The men that had been there. Chanda realized all the crates, save for the lab-rat box, had disappeared into the ship, along with the rest of the mercenaries. “We’re ready to depart as soon as you board.”

  “Thanks, Viktor.” Ankari waved. “We’ll be right in.”

  The man—Viktor—gave Chanda a curious look, but did not—thank the Buddha—ogle her chest or bring up threesomes. He merely disappeared back into the airlock.

  “If he came for us in person, t
hat means he’s ready to go now. He probably got a new job.” Ankari signed the robot’s chest for Lauren, then waved for her to head into the ship.

  “So long as it doesn’t interfere with my research,” Lauren grumbled, walking toward the airlock.

  “Ms. Malhotra?” Ankari said.

  “You can call me Chanda.”

  “All right. Chanda? Why don’t we make you a personal assistant rather than the research cohort Lauren hoped for, and we’ll try this on a provisional basis? We could use some help with admin and maintaining the network site. If things don’t work out, we’ll bring you back to the station, and since this mishap was our mistake, I’ll pay for your passage back home.” Ankari smiled.

  Chanda tried not to feel bad that the “mishap” hadn’t been their mistake at all, that she had carefully engineered it, and that it had already cost these people the price of her fare. Even though her reasons for coming out here were purely selfish—though she knew tens of thousands of people would be terribly disappointed if Nature’s Wrath disappeared because it could no longer pay for server space and customer support—she vowed to be a good employee, to give Ankari everything she asked for. Ankari would not regret this.

  “Just tell me what you need me to do.” Chanda nodded firmly.

  “Help me carry the rats.”

  Chanda nodded again and veered toward one side of the box as Ankari went toward the other. It pleased her that her chosen mentor—who didn’t know yet she had been chosen—did not mind doing such work herself. Maybe it was a small thing, but it seemed promising.

  The size and weight of the box surprised Chanda. She could barely see around it and into the airlock tube. It had to weigh more than fifty pounds. Just how many rats did the company go through?

  “I’m going to have to talk to Lauren about ordering in bulk,” Ankari muttered. “I know she worries about shortages while we’re stuck out among the outer planets without amenities, but this seems a little ridiculous.”