by JC Hay
Thirty minutes past that, and he emerged into a clearing where, on a central pedestal, the gem sat in plain sight. A laugh bubbled up from deep in his gut. Caution kept him from charging forward. He knew from experience that the bastards at the company weren’t going to make it so obviously easy. He grabbed a hefty fallen branch and tossed it into the clearing.
A bolt of electricity crackled from the gem’s tower and exploded the log into flinders.
“Well, that’s a bit of a problem,” he whispered. He looked around for another log and repeated the process. As he’d suspected, the energy coursed through the gem itself before the tower fired. That made the jewel a part of the circuitry. Removing it should shut the system down.
Or it would trigger a massive capacitor discharge that scoured the clearing clean of life. He triggered his comm unit. “Kayana, I’ve got the stone right in front of me. If you wanted to help me out, that would be great.”
He circled around the clearing, studying the pylon from every angle. It took him longer than he expected but even after he’d finished, Kayana hadn’t contacted him back. Ax collected a small handful of rocks and side-armed a toss toward the pylon to get his range right. The rock bounced off the metal surface and dropped into the grass. So he could reach; now he just needed force and accuracy.
He wound up and fired a new rock toward the gem, hoping for enough of an angle to knock it free of the pylon.
“Vandalism? Is that what you’ve been reduced to?” The voice, dripping with sarcasm, made Ax whirl around. Two people in yellow Bellerophon exo-suits stood nearby. The woman was the taller of the two, with a short, androgynous haircut that fit easily under a helmet.
“Marjon,” Ax said. “And, Kitt, right? Are you still huffing each other’s waste air?”
The shorter of the pair, the bronze-skinned Ortiz named Kitt, took a step forward and dropped a hand to the pistol at his hip.
Marjon put her hand on Kitt’s shoulder and tugged him back behind her. “Please tell me you plan to make this difficult, Anaxagoras. The chief said we couldn’t kill you, but there’s a lot of space between where you are now and dead.” As emphasis to her point, she drew out the enormous knife that was her calling card and used it to clean her nails as she leaned against the tree. “Besides, I’m pretty sure Kitt feels he owes you for sneaking off on his watch.”
“Four hours, you bastard,” Kitt growled. “Chief hanged me by my shoulders in heavy-g for four long hours.”
Ax swallowed. The Ortiz had colonized high-gravity worlds, but like most of Gobby’s crew, Kitt had spent too long in space and was more accustomed to lower gravity. Four hours of being crushed under the weight of his own body must have felt like suffocation, but without the ability to die. “I thought you looked taller, buddy. Can you reach the top shelf now?”
As Ax had hoped, the jibe pushed the mercurial Kitt over the edge, and he charged forward. With a quick dodge and a hip check, he knocked the shorter fighter two steps into the clearing.
A lightning bolt from the tower felled him immediately.
Ax spun to run, but Marjon had already closed the difference. Her knife caught the front of his exo-suit and puckered the fabric slightly. “The chief’s really going to hate that,” she said, inclining her head toward what was left of Kitt. “Poor Kitt had almost gotten back into her good graces for losing you. Still, I think you should tell her yourself. Don’t you?”
“Not unless I have to.” He looked to either side. Marjon was famous among Gobby’s crew for her speed—there were whispers that Gobby had hooked the enforcer on some kind of combat drug that heightened her reflexes. Of course, there were also rumors that the woman was a cyborg, so he didn’t put a lot of stock in the stories.
“Damn shame that you do, then.” She smiled and tapped the stud on her lapel with a free hand. “Price of Mercy this is Marjon. I’ve got him. Two to pick up.”
Seventeen
As she walked, Kayana reminded herself that she should have known better. From the outset, Ax had made it clear that he wasn’t interested in a long-term relationship. In the Nine Names, she had said the same thing. Which led to the real question—when had she started to change her mind? Had it been the sex?
No, she reassured herself. It wasn’t the sex.
Much as it might serve the bastard’s overinflated ego for her to say otherwise. Instead, somewhere between the toe-curling orgasms, she realized that she enjoyed bantering with him. What may have started as frustrated antagonism had grown into adolescent teasing, and finally into something akin to flirting over the last several weeks, and she wasn’t sure she could put a finger on when the transition had occurred.
Not that it mattered, since he had just blown up whatever had been trying to grow.
And she’d let him. After an hour hiking, she’d almost made it back to the clearing where they’d arrived. Ax came over the comms at one point, saying he’d found the stone. As though that made a difference. She tapped the comm unit in her ear. “Algol, transfer me aboard please.” She half-expected the AI to ignore her request, but a heartbeat later her stomach twisted with the nausea-inducing disorientation of the matter transfer beam returning her to the ship.
To Kayana’s surprise, Berniss was waiting in the bay when she arrived. At least she could still find her fury. “I’m not interested in being interviewed.”
“The cameras are off.” She folded herself into a chair with perfectly practiced grace and nodded. “I’ve also told Algol to leave us alone for a bit.”
“We’re not girlfriends, Berniss. I’m not going to tell you about boy trouble while we braid each other’s hair.” Kayana sat in one of the other chairs, and Fluff hopped into her lap. She resisted the urge to bury her face in its fur. Cameras or no, she didn’t want to show any weakness in front of Berniss.
The reporter scoffed. “You know, I’d probably be more fun at that than you expect. It’s been a long time since I had a sleepover. But you’re right. That’s not what we’re going to do at all.” She paused and watched Kayana for a moment, then opened up a nearby locker and tossed her a packet of cricket chips. “You still look nauseous. You should eat something.”
Kayana caught the packet without thinking, and looked at it in her hand. Once the words had processed, she tore open the package and dumped some of the crisp snacks into her mouth. After she swallowed the first mouthful, she sighed. “Thanks. So, what are we going to talk about?”
“Regrets, I suspect.” Berniss took a deep breath. “And family. One of my first assignments was as an embedded journalist, working with a mercenary unit on the fringes.”
“And?” Kayana ate another handful of cricket chips, wondering how rude it would be to get up. Probably very. And it would certainly nullify whatever no-camera truce the camerawoman had implemented.
“And the first officer was Malebranki. Gorgeous, broad, and chiseled like Rygellian bronze.”
The woman blushed, and Kayana had to hide a smile. “Careful, I’d think you were fetishizing.”
“I probably am a bit.” Berniss laughed. “How’s that for objectivity? The thing is, after a few months together, I learned Taygen’s family had been about to welcome him home, but then they found about me.”
Kayana nodded. “I’m sorry.”
“I am too, but not for the reasons you think.” She coughed out a self-deprecating chuckle. “I told him to go, that his family was more important. And he went.”
“You have to understand; the House is everything. The maxims—”
“He went to tell them he could be accepted with me, or they could do without him. That if they didn’t recognize the strength of differing viewpoints, then that was their weakness.”
Kayana hissed in a breath. To say such a thing was blasphemy. Yes, one of the maxims covered the value of multiple opinions, but they meant other Malebranki opinions. Other Malebranki strengths.
“The maxims, he told me, weren’t lessons for the Houses at all. They were lessons for individuals. T
o make them strong enough to make their own well-informed decisions and alliances.”
Kayana’s fingers raked through Fluff’s fur but couldn’t find comfort. “You’re saying I should forgive Ax.”
Berniss stood and shook her head. “Hardly. I’m saying he’s a fuckup. We all are. Even you. Sometimes we do the right things for the wrong reasons. Just as often, we do the wrong thing, but for the right reasons. She took out a tablet and leaned it against the console. On the screen, Ax’s face was frozen in mid-sentence. A play button was superimposed over his chest. “You didn’t see this from me.”
Berniss left the room, and Kayana picked up the tablet and pushed play. She recognized the scene immediately – the makeshift confessional that had been set up in engineering. Which meant this was raw footage that should have been saved for the show. Berniss might not be risking her job by sharing, but it skirted close to the line.
Ax’s image sprang to recorded life. “I’m willing to do what it takes for her to win. I promised her a ship, and I’ll damn sure see she gets money enough to buy one. Or a fleet. Whatever it takes for her to get back in with her family.”
The loop was short and it jumped back to the beginning and started again. It played through twice more before Kayana shut it off. She checked the time on the recording, knowing what she’d find – that it had been from before the trip to Vantor.
Like Berniss said – sometimes they did the wrong things for the right reasons. And he’d wanted so badly to give her what he thought she wanted that he hadn’t thought twice about turning on people he didn’t know. She sighed. It didn’t absolve him. But it helped her to understand the decision. Head-to-head challenges were about teams trying to undercut each other. Had she done anything less as part of a pirate crew?
She growled in frustration. Fine. She’d go back and talk to him, at least to clear the air between them.
She tapped a communications stud on the console next to her. “Algol, find Ax’s comm unit on the planet and get ready to transmit me back to the surface.”
“I cannot do that.”
She rolled her eyes. “It’s not against the rules for me to take a break. You can send me back.”
“I cannot send you to Ax’s comm unit on the planet, because it isn’t on the planet.”
A chill traced its way down her back. “What do you mean? Where is he?”
“Currently? His comm unit says that he’s aboard the cutter Price of Mercy and headed to the edge of the system.”
No. Whatever Ax was, they’d done too much together for her to leave him to whatever this Gobnait woman had planned for him. “Algol, move to pursue.”
“I cannot engage with a non-challenge—”
“Do it or I’ll disconnect you and do it myself!” She charged out the door and headed toward the bridge. Whatever happened after could happen after. But it would be both of them making decisions freely. She just had to rescue him first.
Confessional – Kayana
“There’s really only one thing on the audience’s mind, so let’s jump right into that.”
She sits on the stool this time, the soft focus not enough to hide the exhaustion that emanates from her in waves. The more casual look of her Vedenemoan dress lessens her fearsome appearance. “Why am I going to save him.”
“Exactly. Obviously, the ship has accepted this as a course of action. Presumably because reuniting the team is one of its directives. What about your reasons?”
“You already know my reasons, Berniss.”
“The audience at home doesn’t. Try and fill them in on your conflict.”
She sighs. “Now is really not a good time for this.”
“Do you foresee a better one?”
“No, honestly. So fine.” She stretches and shakes her head. “There once was a holovid reporter who told me a story about doing meaningful work while embedded with mercenar—”
<>
“I simply planned to head back up to the ship until he’d finished with the challenge or called for help. I’d never expected him to get captured. We were allies once.” Kayana studies the ceiling as though trying to find an answer there.
“That’s important to you.”
“It has to mean something,” she says, after several seconds of contemplation. “He is a dichotomy. By his own admission, he’s a grifter with a conscience. And, if I’m honest, I don’t want to see him get hurt.”
“Unless it’s by you.”
“He hasn’t made me that angry. More disappointed. He did some hideous things, but if he can be believed, then he did it on my behalf.” The tiredness in her voice drags it down a half-step from her normal register. “When this whole venture started, it was because my ex-fiancé had decided to hire people to do away with me. While I appreciate this Gobnait’s desire to handle these sorts of things herself, I also find it remarkably easy to sympathize with Ax’s position.”
Fluff wanders into the shot, and she lifts it onto her lap for attention. I keep the camera rolling while she pets it because the image subconsciously mirrors at least three holonovella villains. “One other question. There was an unrecorded transfer to the surface of Altaira that wasn’t accompanied by drone. Most logs of the trip have been erased from the data logs. Would you care to discuss that?”
She smiles. “Nope. Don’t have a clue what that might be about. Maybe Fluff here was looking for a little side action.” Kayana cuddles with the animal a moment longer. “Is that what you were doing?”
The footage continues, but no answer is forthcoming.
Eighteen
Kayana leaned against the command console and let her head hang. She needed sleep. They’d been in jump space after the cutter for fourteen hours. It should be the easiest thing to catch a few hours’ rest, but she knew it wouldn’t come in her cabin. The large bed still smelled like Ax. Still smelled like the two of them; like sex and pleasure and a host of memories she didn’t want surrounding her. The shampoo smell of his hair would permeate the pillow, and in the quiet dark she’d play over what had happened until sleep was impossible.
Likewise, she couldn’t very well sleep in Ax’s cabin. There wouldn’t be much chance that the bedclothes had been changed since the last time she and Ax had been in there. The left Berniss’s cabin, and throwing the reporter out just so she could get some shuteye seemed like the height of capriciousness.
She leaned back in the chair and vigorously rubbed her hands over her face, trying to wake up her brain. When her skin tingled from the friction, she sat back up and tapped the communication button on the bridge console.
A moment later the AI responded. “Yes?”
“Do you have the data I requested?” She let the headrest cushion her neck. Maybe she could sleep right here. At least the chair didn’t smell like him. And thanks to the cameras, they hadn’t had sex on the bridge, so there were no memories to chase away.
“I’m still not certain this is an acceptable course of action.”
She resisted the urge to roll her eyes. “You can’t tell me that you haven’t thought about using that big beautiful neural network of yours for something more...entertaining.” Kayana stretched and looked for the most comfortable position in the chair.
“You and I clearly have different definitions of the word entertainment.” The computer actually sounded indignant at the suggestion. Kayana smiled.
“It’s not like I’m asking you to kill anyone. Though I will point out you have been more than happy to threaten me with that in the past few weeks.” Or, you know, the last twenty-four hours, but who was counting?
After a heartbeat, data began scrolling up the console display. As each ship’s information moved past, an image of the vessel was displayed above Ax’s console.
“These ships are the known vessels registered to the Bellerophon Corporation,” the AI intoned. “The factory ship that serves as the headquarters maintains an orbit in the Proxima Secundus system.”
She reached into the holographic display and zoomed in on the details about the other vessel. Most of the data didn’t seem important, but if she read between the lines, patterns revealed themselves. A cargo bay with no interior access could be converted into a hardpoint for missiles or drones. Multiple shuttle bays could just as easily hold short-range fighters.
And all hiding behind the façade of a pharmaceutical factory, which gave it the excuse it needed to go where it wanted.
Kayana had to admit a certain respect for the ingenuity. It made her wish for other circumstances—she and Gobnait might have made a fairly devastating team.
It was almost a shame that robbing her was going to sour that relationship before it could start.
The door to the bridge hissed open, and Berniss walked in. “How long until showtime?”
Kayana looked toward the front of the bridge. “Algol? How long?”
“Three hours to reach the system.”
Three hours. She had a rudimentary plan, but it relied on surprise. Then again, she doubted anyone would have the audacity to attack a corporate factory ship by themselves. So, surprise shouldn’t be an issue.
It was what would happen when the surprise wore off that worried her.
AX FELT MARJON’S CUTTER shudder as it dropped out of hyperspace. Seventeen hours shouldn’t have gone by so fast. He stood up with a groan and stretched his back. The hard shelf that served as a bed barely counted as a place to sleep. Still, at least he’d had a chance to think up a plan. In the eight-by-eight cell he had little room to do much else.
None of them were good plans, mind you, but he’d thought up a couple.
Mostly he was just thankful that Marjon had taken him to Gobby, instead of Gobby coming to get him. It meant that Kayana wouldn’t get caught up in his shit any further. Pain lanced behind his ribs at the thought of her.
