by Imogene Nix
She looked at him blankly.
“I want you to prepare Gorthos and Vilmar so they can take the ship under control if necessary. I know you can set emergency bypasses, so if the Dendaran’s decide they want to carry out a search and seize of things, like your personal shuttle, they can’t access it. Or the data we received from the Juran authorities.”
She nodded with a tiny jerk. “Sure. Let me get my things together, and I’ll meet you there in ten minutes. I need to set my personal emergency systems as well.”
He exhaled as he watched her leave the bridge. She was an extraordinary woman. If only he could make her understand; if only she could see what he saw.
Sandon hurried to his office and locked down his personal systems. It wouldn’t do for anyone to access them while he was absent. His personal ruminations about Levia were just that—personal.
Barely fifteen minutes passed and she joined him, followed by Vilmar and Gorthos. He smiled, watching the way Gorthos walked warily around her. The threat that she might consider the Aparvee with Gorthos had thankfully dissipated.
“I’ve called you all together to make preparations for the period of time that we will be on Excelsior. Levia is going to institute some security measures that will lock down certain parts of the ship and memory systems. She will show you how to engage with and override where necessary.”
Levia inclined her head, and as he moved away from the primary console on his desk she took up the position. “Right, see this?” Her fingers tapped at the keys as she set up the security protocols. “This will give you access to…”
He watched in silence, amazed, as he regularly was, at just how at home she was in the ship’s computer system. Sure that soon, once the danger had passed, she would be his.
Chapter 7
Three long and totally frustrating days had passed since the last encounter. Levia silently escorted Sandon to the office they’d been summoned to. They’d sat until called into the conference room. Each day, he’d presented his case and waited for the situation to be escalated to someone else. This morning, he’d met with the head of the Mining and Development Ministry, who had the ultimate say on whether their previous agreement held.
She squirmed in the seat, and it squeaked beneath her.
“You need to be still. Find your inner zen.”
Levia barked out a laugh at Sandon’s quiet words. “Sadly, I’m more action oriented than political. You’re the one with the inner zen.” Levia bracketed the words with her fingers. “I’m just the grunt.”
“Do you really believe that?” The surprise in his tone had her turning toward him.
“Well, yes. I mean, why else did you bring me here?” She indicated the hushed interior of the building, and he smiled. Over the last three days, the smile had become more strained, but it still sucked the oxygen from her lungs.
“Maybe because I wanted you close by.” His words delivered a sucker punch to her solar plexus.
“Sandon…” The helpless tide that usually surged at his words rolled over her again.
“I know. Right words, but wrong time. When we’re done, I want to talk to you.” His hand slid over hers, clasping it lightly, and his thumb traced gentle circles on the top. “We need to sort out this… Whatever this is between us.”
“We shouldn’t.” Right now, all the arguments she’d used, the hiding, none of it was doing anything for her. His constant proximity chewed away at the barriers she kept erecting between them, but the hot, sweet pump of blood through her veins told her that the time had almost come.
She’d known and wrestled with the knowledge that she had to choose. Take the final and irrevocable step with him or leave the Golden Echo. The latter nearly tore her apart, but to accept Sandon’s touch? God, how that scared her! It wasn’t like planning a tactical mission or even fixing an engine. They were easy. She could plan for all the eventualities.
“Captain? The minister will see you now.”
Lost in the mess of emotions, she hadn’t heard anyone approach.
They rose together, as one, and as they stepped forward the woman held out a hand.
“I’m sorry. We can’t admit your…pilot. You do understand?” The woman smiled somewhat vacuously in Sandon’s direction and every bone in Levia’s body tightened.
“No, I’m sorry, I don’t understand.” Sandon’s grip on her hand would have been crushing if not for her enhanced pain threshold. When she started to tug away, he held on.
“She’s not… Well, we can’t allow a…” The nervous twitch the woman hadn’t exhibited before caught Levia’s gaze.
“Sandon, it’s okay. I’ll wait here for you.” The harder she pulled, the more pressure he exerted on her hand.
“No. It’s not all right.” His breath was jerky, and she realized just how much strain he was laboring under. “You’re my pilot. Part of my crew. My—”
She stood on tiptoe and placed her lips against his, cutting off whatever he was about to say. His body was like steel, ramrod straight and hard, and for a moment, some nameless emotion welled deep inside her gut.
The woman behind them gave a tiny gasp, and Levia felt a thrill at the shock it indicated.
Slowly, she slid down until she was back on her feet in front of Sandon. His eyes were wide with shock, but a satisfied grin danced on his lips. “I’ll be here waiting for you. Go get ’em.”
“But…” He must have read the message in her gaze, the one that said everything would be fine, because he shook his head. “I’ll be out as soon as I can.”
The lightness in her heart buoyed her up, and she headed for the seat and slumped back down.
“Cybes aren’t supposed to be human.” The venom in the staffer’s voice wasn’t unsurprising.
“We’re human. We think, we feel, and we bleed.” Levia fought the emotions that grew in her chest. It wasn’t the first time, and likely it wouldn’t be the last time, she heard this particular litany.
“But you’re an assassin. A killer. You shouldn’t be near normal people. And certainly not people like him.”
Levia couldn’t stop herself, she whipped her head around and looked at the woman, who stood in front of her, white and shaking. “So, it sounds to me like you have some kind of issue with Cybes. But you know what? I’m more than that. I’m a woman, and I’m getting kind of pissed off. So please leave now.”
“I’m going to report you. You shouldn’t even be here. They were supposed to…”
There was so much more than mere interest now welling inside Levia. “What? What were they supposed to do?” She stood, muscles bunching, ready for whatever might happen next.
The woman gave a squeak and retreated toward the far wall. “I’m going to report you. Right now!” She scurried around the corner and Levia stood there, aware that her anger was foolish and could endanger their mission.
It really wasn’t a surprise when three burly men entered the room, with the tiny woman cowering behind them. “Her. You need to arrest her. She’s a Cybe.”
The biggest of the men smiled. It wasn’t pleasant or welcoming. In fact, it left her with a greasy churning in her belly. “You are to be placed into detention while we…”
Levia pivoted and ran.
* * * *
“Thank you for seeing me, Minister.” Sandon shook the outstretched hand, feeling more assured with the hard copy of the carefully rewritten contract in his grasp. Now to find Levia and they could celebrate. Old-fashioned style. Wine and dinner followed by something far more intimate, if he had his way.
The door closed behind him softly and he made his way down the hall, stopping at the waiting room, but it was empty. “Levia?”
His heart thudded as he glanced around. Where is she?
“Oh, your pilot has been detained.” The woman, staffer, he’d seen earlier patted her blonde hair and gave him a come-hither smile.
The chill of an icy finger slid its way down his spine, or maybe it was a feeling of foreboding? Either way, he did
n’t think it was good.
The woman smiled as she blinked her eyelashes at him. “Oh, don’t worry about her. I’m sure she’ll be fine. But right now, how about I clock out and—”
“Where is she?” The snarl was feral and the staffer stepped back, her grin dying away like ice beneath the harsh beating sun.
“I… She was taken into custody.” The woman’s tone was brittle, and he knew she’d had a hand in whatever happened to Levia.
“What did you do?”
The woman looked shocked. Horrified at the sight of his anger. She’d moved back, away from him, and sort of somehow shrunk into herself. A tiny glimmer of amusement shone before it was extinguished by the bitter fury that suffused him.
“I? Nothing that was out of the usual. I alerted the security to the fact—”
Damn, she’d tipped them off that Levia was a Cybe! “Where? Where would they take her?” He crowded in, pushing home his anger so that she blanched.
“To… To the security station.”
“Take me there.” He reached out and grabbed her arm, and she squeaked.
She escorted him out of the room and down a long, narrow hall. A chill invaded his bones, or maybe it was the sense of loss and horror that Levia regularly had to deal with this kind of mindset.
At a set of steps, the staffer attempted to pull away.
“You’re not going anywhere until you show me where they took her. Then I will be making contact with my Freighters Union and placing an official complaint about you, the security sector, and your planet for this.”
“I… I’m only following orders, Captain.” Her voice sounded faint, and he pulled her closer, watching the dilation of her pupils and the shallowness of her breath. She was scared? It was surely only a miniscule amount of what Levia felt every time she landed on one of these godforsaken planets.
At the bottom of the staircase, a heavy metal door stood cracked open. From within, he detected grunts and the sound of fist on flesh, the whap-whack filling his consciousness.
Releasing the woman, he barely noticed that she stumbled as he surged in her direction, stopping only at the sight before him.
Two men lay on the ground, and Levia was huddled in a corner as a man lifted his hand against her. A dribble of blood trickled over her chin, but the set of her face told him she might be hurt but not out.
“Touch her again, and I guarantee you won’t live to regret it.”
Levia’s attacker turned swiftly, and in that instant, she drove her fist into the back of his head. His eyes widened, rolled backward so only the whites shone, then he crumpled to the floor.
“Well, you took your time.” She moved around the body on the ground in front of her, bent and inspected him, all the while shaking her hand. “Huh. He’ll be out for an hour or two and wake up with a whopper of a headache. These other two should be coming around soon, so I humbly suggest we get out of here.”
Levia staggered in his direction then slumped into his embrace.
“Can you walk?” Right now, he wanted to strip her down and check her body, run his hands over it to ensure she hadn’t sustained any life-threatening injuries.
The snort filled the air. “I can get out of here and get the shuttle into space. But I think after that either a sleep or the medic might be the order of the day.”
“Then we better move.” He started to drag her to the door, and she reached out and gripped his hand before she shook her head.
“I have a better idea.” She wound her arms around his middle and kissed him fully on the lips. “Hang tight, flyboy.”
He felt a sting as she poked something through the back of his tunic, and the world turned black.
* * * *
Sandon was still out as Levia lowered him into a chair. She sighed. “Should have thought about that.” Of course, he’d probably never had any experience of instantaneous matter transmission, but then her experience was limited too. The click of the safety harness filled the air, and she wondered how long they had. “Probably not long at all.”
The instrument panel beneath her fingers shone and she played it, inputting their destination and picking the most direct route. The sooner they were out of there, the better.
Her body protested, aches and bruises were already blooming, a reminder of Ordan Mayerber and his murderous determination to extinguish her. “Dendaran bastard.”
“Who?” Sandon spoke slowly, and the sound was slightly slurred.
Levia turned. He looked stunned still, but she exhaled. Once he’d woken fully, she could help him throw off the fog that went with that form of transmission.
“Mayerber.”
He frowned, the action slow and studied. “Why?”
“Because that idiot is behind this. Again! The stupid fool who tried to restrain me spilled his guts.” Well, before she’d managed an uppercut to his chiseled jaw, she remembered with a tiny bite of pleasure.
“Mayerber? He caused all this?” He was still lost about ten steps behind her, Levia realized and took pity on Sandon.
“He ordered the security agents to hold us. Sadly for them, he didn’t mention that even among the Cybes my hand-to-hand and strategic planning are highly developed.” The whine of the engines told her they needed to lift off now. “Hang on while I get us out of here, then I can explain all.”
The thrust of the ship pushed them against the seats, and she welcomed the forces, even though it pushed the skin against bone and made her ache even more. At least she was alive, something she wouldn’t have been if she wasn’t strong enough to fend off the attack.
Oh, but the intelligence she’d managed to glean from them in that moment or two where he’d been at her mercy. The security officers were little more than pups when it came to strategy.
“You’re hurt.”
She didn’t even glance in Sandon’s direction. “It happens in this game.”
His silence should have been unnerving, but it wasn’t. No, it filled her with joy that he understood the need to get the bird off the ground before doing something about the scrapes and aches.
She watched the viewer, her hands moving like a symphony as they smashed through the layers of atmosphere until suddenly it gave, and the ship punched into the blackness.
“What happened back there?”
She tapped one last command into the ship’s computer as she let her mind settle. Coming down from the high of a good attack always took time. “Mayerber made contact and ordered that I be detained. But as it’s a little out-of-the-way planet, he forgot to tell them I’m a reasonable tactician, and they underestimated me. They attacked, and I took two down by the time you got there.” She shrugged off the memory of the pounding of her heart and the surge of adrenalin.
“That doesn’t make a whole heap of sense.”
“Maybe not to you, but he’s trying to slow us down. He wants to set the stage, and capture me. Up until now, all those searches? They were mind games, trying to set me on edge. But he failed. Just like last time.” She unclipped the harness, dropping to her knees beside him. “Sandon?”
“So why do I feel like I’ve been hit with a brick?” There was a trace of petulance in his voice.
“Oh.” She stood and brushed an invisible bit of dirt from her knees, all the while avoiding his gaze. He wouldn’t be happy, she’d already surmised, when she revealed exactly what she’d done. “Well, I managed to install an IMT.”
The blank look on his face told her she needed to explain that.
“Instantaneous Matter Transmitters allow for the disintegration, transportation, and reassembling of matter parts. Used usually for transporting humans…”
“Not that. Where and how?”
“Oh. I installed it into the shuttle after Omega V. Anyway, we needed to get out quickly and until now, I haven’t had a chance to properly test…”
He made a noise, and this time she did look at him, appalled as he paled further.
His eyes were closed and breathing labored. Just a
s she was about to engage the medi-droid he opened them. “You hadn’t tested it? You just used it?”
She nodded. “I couldn’t afford for us to be found. So I just…” She’d taken a risk, a calculated one, and it had paid off. “Look, it worked, right? That’s all that matters at this point.”
Tendrils of anger burrowed through her system. He should thank her for getting them out of there in one piece. While those security guys weren’t ever going to make it in any army, they had enough grunt to do them both some damage.
He unclipped the harness, the chink echoing in the silence. “Just get us out of here.” Sandon brushed past her, and she closed her eyes. Counted to five.
“I don’t know why you’re so damned angry. I saved our carcasses back there.” The sullen words escaped and he hissed.
Levia spun toward him and stopped as she saw the tension in his stance.
“Yes. But at what cost, Levia?” He swiped an unsteady hand over his face.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, you go into situations, get yourself beaten to a pulp, then take a chance on technology that you haven’t checked.” He shrugged. “Do what you think is best. I’m going to lie down.”
She watched his retreating figure, wondering just what the hell she should do now.
* * * *
Sandon seethed for the next several hours. Sleep was the last thing he wanted, but he also knew that if he spoke again now, it would more than likely destroy the connection they’d formed. So he hid. He seethed.
“Bloody hard-headed woman.” More than once, he was sure she came to the door, but at those times he feigned sleep while his mind played on its current favorite topic: the many ways Levia took chances with herself. The more he thought about it, the more his anger grew. “She wants to take chances? Fine, I don’t care!”
He realized that right now, if he spoke to her, he’d say something stupid. When the hail blared and her terse, “We’re nearing the Echo. Strap in,” rang through the cabin, he sat up with a curse, knowing he should be there, on the bridge.
