by Jenn Burke
* * *
The door to the interrogation room popped open. Zed expected to see Good Cop and Bad Cop again, as he had for the past...however long it had been. It was tough to track time on a ship, especially when the light level stayed the same in his cell. They’d fallen into something of a routine—the cops tag-teamed him, he ignored them, everyone had a wonderful time until the metaphorical buzzer dinged and they took him back to his cell. Instead of the two cops, though, a familiar figure stepped into the room. General Bradley.
He hid his surprise. Though he’d been delivered to the Cambridge by his former CO, he hasn’t expected the man to hang around. Interrogation wasn’t his thing—too far below his paygrade. Did they think Zed would talk to Bradley when he wouldn’t talk to the tag-team duo? Maybe. Zed couldn’t deny that there was still a twang of loyalty in his head when he thought of his CO. Bradley wasn’t a bad man, he was just caught in a shitty situation.
But...maybe he was here for a different reason?
Zed straightened in his chair, trying not to get too far ahead of himself. “Sir.”
Bradley grimaced at the manacles around his wrists, but made no move to get rid of them. “Quite the pickle you’ve gotten yourself into.”
The tiny spark of hope that Bradley had been there to free him sputtered and died. “Yes, sir.”
The general arranged one of the chairs, moving it to the side so he could face Zed without the table between them, and settled into it. A gust of air flowed from him, almost a sigh, as he inspected Zed.
“You know why you’re here.”
Zed clamped his mouth shut and raised his chin.
“Why is it such a big deal? The ashies obviously figured something out, something that could help your teammates. Why keep it a secret? Why fake your death?”
Zed kept his lips pressed tightly together. The Guardians had never said he couldn’t tell anyone about their involvement, but he didn’t want to tell Bradley. Not like this, in an interrogation room, where everything that came out of his mouth would be suspect anyway. The AEF already thought he was a liar—telling them the Guardians had resurrected his ass wouldn’t change that opinion.
“You know what the next step would be, usually. Don’t you?” Bradley leaned back into his chair, his arms crossed.
A prisoner who wouldn’t talk would be given special incentive to do so. Torture wasn’t humane, but then, war tended to file down the levels of what wasn’t acceptable until anything was okay, as long as you got results.
“Don’t make them do this, Zed.” Had the man ever called him by his first name? Certainly not like that, in a pleading, concerned tone, with his voice almost shaking in desperation. Chills skittered down Zed’s spine.
Damn it, they were seriously going to take that next step, weren’t they? If he didn’t speak to Bradley, the next person who walked through that door was going to be one of the specialists the AEF would never admit to having in their employ. A torturer, someone skilled in how to dish out pain, breaking down walls and resistance. Maybe he should just give in. The Guardians had never said it was a secret—they’d called him proof. He was the evidence that the races in the galaxy were not so different. Essences of them could coexist in the same body.
He couldn’t imagine the warm presence that had brushed his mind would want him to withstand torture to keep that a secret.
But what proof did he have, other than the cuff on his wrist, just barely visible beneath the manacles? They’d tried removing it when he came on board, but Zed had no idea how to do so and the AEF techs hadn’t figured it out, either. So it remained, placid and inert, nothing more than a decoration. Certainly it didn’t appear Guardian-like. So even if he said something, they wouldn’t believe him. They wouldn’t even consider it. History insisted that the Guardians didn’t intervene in that manner. To stop wars, sure. To save civilizations from extinction, yeah. Not to save one individual man.
Talking wouldn’t save him, so he might as well stay silent. Lips pressed together, Zed shook his head.
Bradley sighed and scuffed his hands through his hair. He rose slowly, reluctantly. Emotions flickered through his dark eyes, emotions Zed had never seen on the hard man before. He looked strangely vulnerable, as if a stiff breeze would be too much for him to take.
“I’m sorry,” he said, his voice soft. Then he turned and left the room.
Zed barely had time to catch his breath before the door opened again, bringing with it another familiar figure. This one wasn’t nearly as welcome a sight as Bradley. In fact, if Zed had never seen her again in his life, he could have died a very happy man.
Dr. Carlisle Preston appeared much as she had during his final medical exam before the AEF cut him and his team loose. She’d been their guide—and their nemesis—during Project Dreamweaver, the one responsible for all the tests and procedures that changed them into something more than human. Her caramel-colored hair was swept back on the sides, with loose curls cascading down to her shoulders. Her eyes were rich and warm—at first glance, no one would expect she was as cold and efficient as a droid.
As far as he knew, Preston had no off-the-books training as a specialist. But then...everyone knew Zed would be resistant to traditional methods.
Shit. This was not good.
“Carly.” Good. Judging by the narrowing eyes, she still hated that name.
“Major Anatolius.” Ever task-focused, Preston pulled a couple of items from the pockets of her white SFT jacket and placed them on the table. A hypo-syringe, like the sort Nessa favored, and a knife. Zed’s jaw flexed. She left them there for a moment, standing on the other side of the table, and just let him look at them.
Zed drew in a deep breath. He could do this. He could withstand this. “Party time, huh.”
“I doubt this will feel much like a party, Major. You have a particular resistance to pain and the officers in charge of this interrogation have asked me to mitigate it.” Those warm eyes glittered and not for the first time, Zed wondered if the good doctor was a bit of a sadist. It would explain a lot. “A specialist could cut you with this blade and you’d just retreat into the Zone and ride it out. You’d pay for it, of course. Still suffering the migraines? You got them the worst of anyone.”
Zed stayed silent.
“But that’s not what I’m going to do.” She lifted the knife in her right hand and the syringe in her left. “Remember Cain?”
A sharp breath jerked past Zed’s lips.
“You do. Good. It was a shame about him. But we learned, right? From then on, we made sure the ritual only happened when you were all healthy and pain-free. But that didn’t mean we didn’t file away that intel. Just in case.”
Distracted by the doctor’s words and memories of one of the Project Dreamweaver participants who didn’t survive the training, Zed didn’t read the tensing and bunching of Preston’s muscles until it was too late. She whipped the knife downward and it flew through the air, slicing into Zed’s bare foot. Zed barely had time to register the sudden onslaught of pain before Preston stabbed the syringe into his neck. Biting, stinging liquid slipped into his veins, a sensation Zed remembered. Hated. Feared.
Fucking bitch did not just inject me with the stin poison. Please, God.
“What—” Zed gasped as his vision grayed out, then returned, too bright, too harsh. The pain in his foot suddenly intensified, igniting into an inferno a thousand times worse than the original injury.
“Your interrogators will be back later.” Preston reached down and yanked the knife out of Zed’s foot. Zed screamed as the pain jolted up into realms he’d never known he could experience. “I suggest you speak to them. Enjoy your trip, Major.”
The doctor’s words ebbed and flowed, almost drowned out by the waves of agony shooting through Zed’s body. Her white-coated silhouette wavered and broke apart, then came back toget
her again. Zed reached out and watched his fingers separate from his hand and fly toward her, begging when the rest of him couldn’t move.
Not real. Hallucination, it’s a hallucination.
That soft thought didn’t stop him from trying to collect his fingers and put them back where they belonged. Except his body didn’t want to obey him. He made the mistake of shifting his injured foot. Fire raced up his leg, burning him inside, everywhere, growing white-hot, blue, and Zed knew, he knew it was going to burn him up, burn him out, destroy him entirely...
His screams rang in his ears and ripped his throat, and he couldn’t stop.
* * *
Felix switched off the striplight and closed the supply room door, wincing at the quiet hiss that might betray his presence in the asteroid’s docking bay. He didn’t want to leave with any of Dieter’s equipment, though. He wasn’t that much of a rogue. Quietly, he picked his way back along the catwalk to the small pier that served the bay’s only inhabitant, the Chaos.
“Don’t even think about it.”
Felix started at the sound of Elias’s voice but did not turn. Instead, he put a hand on the side of his ship. The ceramix plates were cool against his palm, around the same temperature of the inside of the asteroid. They’d been here long enough for the Chaos’s internal and external temperature to equalize, meaning the drive would also be cool. Not ideal.
Elias wasn’t going to let him leave alone, though, and if he was honest with himself, Felix would admit that he hadn’t really wanted to go alone, without his crew, or his captain. The man he counted as brother and best friend. But neither could the pull toward Zed be denied.
“Upgrades are done.” Report delivered, now for the plea. “I need to be there. I can’t sit here while Ryan gathers information and Brennan hurls legal objections. I know everyone is doing everything that can be done, but the AEF don’t play by the same rules as the Anatolius family. This isn’t going to be a legal battle. The AEF aren’t going to let Zed go.”
“So you think flying in there, shields blazing—because, face it, that’s all you’ve got to throw at a military drift—is going to make a difference.”
“I can’t hurt the Cambridge, I know that. Hell, I might not even be able to sneak aboard—”
“That was your plan? Holy hell, are you high?”
Felix flattened his palm against the side of the ship, pushing into it with all his strength. Still, he could feel the tremble in his fingers, the itch across his shoulders and that weird twitch at the base of his spine. He didn’t know if he craved oblivion of the chemical kind or the actual kind. If love drove him, or the memories beating against his skull had finally driven him to madness. All he knew was that he needed to be with Zed. That he’d been wrong to leave.
You’re not as broken as you pretend to be.
Oh, but he was.
“Not high.” He hadn’t taken a single pill since they’d arrived at the asteroid. “Just wrecked. The stin broke me into too many pieces. You did a good job putting me back together, but the cracks are still all there. Zed’s death...”
“Fix...fuck.” He could hear Elias pacing back and forth on the decking. “Man, I should just let you go. Write off my half of the ship, my life. Curse the day I let Zander Bloody Anatolius walk on board.”
A quiet sound interrupted Elias’s rant. Then a moist breath. Felix squeezed his eyes shut and remained resolutely turned away. If he looked Elias in the eye, saw even a hint of a tear—
“But I’m not going to. Wanna know why? Because this is my ship, too. You’re part of my crew. Might not mean anything to you anymore, but it means everything to me. What we’ve built together is my life. And what we’re doing right now means something. We’re not just shipping shit and tracing skips—though I’ve a damn mind to list one for you, you bastard. Where is the Felix I signed a partnership deed with? Where is my little brother?”
“I’m right here.” But his voice sounded weak, even reflected back by the plating on the side of the Chaos. His ship, their ship.
“Then turn around and tell me what you want. Tell me to my face that you’re gonna cut and run again.”
Felix whirled around. “I’m not running this time. I’m going back to Sol, to where I’m supposed to be!”
“And leaving your crew behind. Don’t you trust us?”
“Of course I do, but I don’t...you don’t...shit.” He bowed inward and scrubbed at his eyes, finding them dry, which didn’t surprise him. He had nothing left to give. “I’m so sick of fighting with everyone.”
“Then just stop. Let us in. Stop treating us like the enemy. It’s not as if you have a lot of friends. You need us. We’re on the same damned side. At least, I thought we were.” Elias gestured toward the ship. “If you take her, that will be it. I won’t stop you, but we’ll be done, man. I won’t follow you. You can be a skip without a trace. Is that what you really want?”
“I...” Felix shut his mouth and looked at the man who really might be his only friend. He had other acquaintances, and he supposed there were a handful of people in the galaxy who thought of themselves as his friends. Marnie, Ryan, Theo from specialist training. He had his crew. Eli, Ness and Qek.
He didn’t know if he had Zed. For all his obsessiveness over that one man, he didn’t know if he truly had him—as a friend, as all the more he wanted so desperately.
And that was the thing that pulled him apart. Had been splitting him in two for the past however many days.
He dropped his gaze to the deck. “I...I love him, Eli. I’ve never loved anyone but him. He’s left me so many times, but I still love him. It’s stupid and it’s insane and I know that throwing away everything for this one man would be the worst thing I could ever do, but I don’t want to lose him again. I don’t think I can do it all again.” He sucked in breath on a quavering note. “I know I can’t do it again.”
Elias’s sudden hug rocked him backward. Warm arms squeezed him tight, and though suddenly made breathless, Felix didn’t struggle against the hold. He hugged back, tightly. He wrapped his arms around his only friend and held on for all he was worth.
“I know you love him, you stupid git. God, why do you think we’re all here, doing all of this. He’s ours too. C’mon. You need six hours of real sleep and then we’ll talk about maybe getting closer to Sol.”
Real sleep. Despite the fact the asteroid had over a dozen unoccupied beds, Felix hadn’t taken advantage of a single one. He’d been working. Upgrading the comm system, reprogramming the shield emitters. Keeping himself busy, active and engaged.
“Need to do more than talk about it.”
“We’ll do more than talk about it, I promise.”
Chapter Fourteen
Everything hurt. His muscles, his joints, his head, his stomach, his other organs...hell, even the arteries and veins themselves that had carried the stin poison ached. Everything blended into one giant ball of ow.
Zed lay on his cot, squinting against the harsh light of his cell. He wasn’t sure how long he’d been staring at the brilliantly white ceiling, his mind mostly blank, but it was oddly restful to actively think of nothing. It kept him from dwelling on what Preston had done to him. As far as he could remember, Bad Cop and Good Cop hadn’t been around to ask him questions—not that he’d have been able to give any decent answers. They wanted him worn down, battered and bruised. More receptive and pliant.
“Fuck ‘em.” He swallowed and lifted his right hand to rub at his face.
His bracelet flashed. He stopped all movement and stared at it. In the days since he’d left the Guardians’ care with his new jewelry, he hadn’t figured out its purpose. He’d thought the Guardians had meant it as a mark of ownership—except that didn’t really fit with what he knew of the aliens. Okay, granted, he didn’t know much, but he knew more than anyone else. He refused to
believe that aliens who’d felt so warm and comforting in his mind—accepting of everything he was, and supportive—would want to collar him. So it had to be something else.
Zed pushed himself up, swinging his feet around to sit on the edge of the cot. He sucked in a breath as pain shot through his left foot. Tearing his eyes away from his bracelet for a moment, he noted the bandage encircling the arch and sole of his foot, then wrapping around his ankle for security. Well, wasn’t Preston considerate. Stab him, then patch him up.
“Asshole,” he muttered, his voice rough.
Blue lights raced along the surface of his bracelet. It reminded him of a message indicator light on a wallet—but no wallet looked like this. The illumination danced along and within the surface of the cuff, strangely beautiful. Zed ran his fingers over them, deciding he was probably still a little stoned because they were just so damned captivating.
“I’m Henry the Eighth, I am, Henry the Eighth I am I am...”
Zed flinched as the words reverberated through his cell. God, he hated that song, from the moment he’d first heard it at the Academy—in that same awful nasal accent. He frowned at his cuff. “Ryan?”
“Holy shit, it was a comm channel.” Ryan’s voice quivered with excitement. Even though he hadn’t spoken to Ryan in—what, a decade?—he still recognized the other man’s voice. “Zed, oh my God, Zed. How are you doing, man?”
“Been better,” he admitted.
“I bet. What the fuck did you do to warrant a visit from Preston? Heard stories about her.”
“How did you—” Right. Ryan was plugged in. He’d know who was who aboard the Cambridge. “I wouldn’t talk.”
“Good for you.”
“How are you talking to me?”
“Honestly, I’m not sure. I found a weird frequency that hadn’t been onboard before you were, and I just kept pinging it. In case.” He paused. “It kind of reminds me of the frequencies around the gate to the Hub.”
