Enemy Within

by Marcella Burnard

  “My ship,” he whispered. “It’s within hailing.” He uncovered his badge.

  She started, eyes wide, and let her hand drop to her side.

  “You can’t lift the lockdown from here, can you?” he surmised.

  “While I’m in enemy hands being tortured to accomplish those ends?” she replied. “Of course not.”

  “Keyed to genetic imprint?”

  She nodded. “Retinal and print scans.”

  “Sindrivik? Please tell me you have communications.”

  “A few seconds, Captain,” Sindrivik replied.

  Ari cursed. Seaghdh gathered that she hadn’t realized that Sindrivik was the best systems wizard in the Claugh nib Dovvyth. The young man could have had his pick of careers and lived very comfortably. Seaghdh wiped the sweat from his face and wondered if Sindrivik thought joining the Murbaasch Tu was the adventure he’d hoped for.

  “What about the Sen Ekir’s fuel valve?” Ari demanded. “They won’t have power for lift without . . .”

  “It’s in,” Pietre snapped.

  She barked a single laugh. “You damned spiteful bastard. Good work.”

  “Captain!” Turrel hollered over the open com.

  Seaghdh and Ari glanced at one another at the scream of fighter engines in the background. “Flyby! They’re coming around. Headed your way!”

  “Acknowledged.”

  “Communications online!” Sindrivik cried. “Response to our distress call! Claugh nib Dovvyth carrier on routine patrol! She’s an hour out! Get back to the ship!”

  “No time!” Ari replied. “Lift! Now! Put the planet between you and the mother ship!”

  “Alex,” her father grated, “we won’t abandon you . . .”

  “Yes, you will!” she countered. “The fighters are back, Dad. If we run, we’ll lead them to you. Now get out of here! Close open channel! Going to planetside com badges only!”

  Six ships swept low over the town. The noise of their engines changed pitch. Light shimmered next to the well.

  “They’re porting in!” Seaghdh yelled, lifting the rifle and peppering the teleport shimmer with fire.

  “Porting? That makes no sense! Why not land?” Ari added her shots. A second, then a third teleport distortion appeared on either side of the first.

  “Why ask me? Where are the other three?” Seaghdh demanded, glancing wildly around.

  A humanoid form materialized in the center of Settlement-1. Ari swore. Seaghdh’s attention snapped full front. He echoed her curse.

  “Save some fun for us,” Turrel rasped over the open com.

  “Our weapons have no effect,” Ari said.

  “Wonderful news,” V’k grumbled.

  The second shimmer resolved, then the third. They had once been humanoid or from one of the related races, but their bodies had been distorted, mutated into grotesque parodies of the humanoid shape. Their eyes were dead, flat white. Even from several meters away, Seaghdh could see veins distended and pulsing. Bulges of tissue and muscle where tissue and muscle didn’t belong strained against repulsive, ocher, bio-organic armor. It reminded him of the chitinous exoskeletons he knew from the corpse beetles of his home world.

  Seaghdh grabbed Ari’s arm. She didn’t move. Glancing at her, he paused. The haunted, sick look in her face struck him. He should pursue it, find out what she knew or was remembering, after they were safe.

  He sprinted for the tree line half a kilometer away. Ari jounced along in his wake until she found her stride.

  “No good!” she gasped. “They’re on us. Tracking.”

  And firing. When they broke from the cover of the buildings, laser fire sizzled into the dirt behind them. Seaghdh scowled. Evidence suggested they were better shots than that.

  Weaving to avoid the bursts of energy, he began to notice a pattern. The rate of fire increased, singeing the plants and soil, when he swung toward the trees.

  Ari jerked out of his grasp and kicked his legs out from under him. He landed hard. As she dove to the ground, he saw the shimmer of another teleport distortion. She rolled to one side.

  “Incoming ’port!” she shouted. “We’re being herded!”

  “They’re on a trap-and-capture order, Ari, or we’d already be dead,” he snapped. “Get to the trees!”

  Cursing, Ari came to one knee and brought the rifle up. The three soldiers had stopped firing. They strode through the field, their deliberate pace never wavering.

  Seaghdh saw the rifle in her grasp tremble. What was she . . . He stared at the soldier she’d sighted on. Scorch marks in the armor. So they weren’t impervious to weapon’s fire.

  She eased her finger to the trigger and squeezed. The shot went wide.

  “What are you . . .” Seaghdh began.

  Ari fired another shot. It missed the leader. The soldier behind his right shoulder, however, stopped dead as the burst of energy impacted the side of his face. His limbs twitched as if he couldn’t control them. Static crackled in the air before him.

  Seaghdh dropped to the soil beside Ari, took aim, and swiftly placed three bolts into the leader’s head, then another series of bolts into the third soldier’s face. Without waiting to gauge the effect, Seaghdh hauled Ari to her feet and urged her into the trees just as the other three soldiers materialized from teleport.

  They turned on their heels as one and followed.

  “Looks like the capture order has been rescinded,” Ari gasped.

  Seaghdh risked a look back. The soldiers trailed them easily, their pace much faster than the first three. They’d raised their weapons, but weren’t firing. The four colony sites he’d seen flashed through his memory, nothing broken, no burn marks, all the victims dispatched with a single shot.

  He swore and struggled to put more trees between the two of them and their followers. “Definitive search and destroy,” he affirmed. “Turrel?”

  “Hold them off for a few more minutes!” V’kyrri shouted.

  “Head shots,” Ari managed to get out before a tree limb swiped her in the face. Blood oozed from a cut across one cheek.

  “Negative, Captain,” V’kyrri answered, his voice tight with effort. “I can’t get a lock on them. It’s like they aren’t there.”

  Seaghdh’s heart squeezed hard. “Belay that!” he shouted. He hadn’t told her what V’kyrri was capable of, and he desperately needed to explain before she worked it out.

  Pain showed in the crinkles of confusion surrounding Ari’s eyes. Seaghdh lurched to one side as his foot slid out from under him. Fighting for balance, he loosed his hold on Ari. She ran several meters, before she seemed to realize she’d lost him and turned, hesitating.

  He cast a glance back at their pursuit as he found his footing again. The soldiers ignored him. They’d turned for Ari. His heart clenched hard and he swore.

  She echoed him. “They’re after me. Why?”

  Seaghdh sprinted into the underbrush, keeping the soldiers in his line of sight, but swinging wide enough to stay out of range of their weapons. He hoped. Ignoring the sting of whipping branches and burn of weary muscles, he jumped a deadfall before angling the direction he’d last seen Ari.

  She’d run but not far. Good.

  He stopped, brought his rifle up, and cursed. Trees and brush obscured his shot. At least he’d gotten far enough ahead that he could afford the time to find the clearest line of fire.

  “Ari,” he said to the com badge, “this way. Bring them to me.”

  “Negative,” V’kyrri countered, his voice tinny on the com channel. “I’ve got survivors, Captain! She’s headed straight for them. They’ve been shielded underground. They know we’re here.”

  Damn it! V’kyrri hadn’t stopped reading. How much had Ari picked up? Had she . . .

  One of the soldiers jerked to a halt, turned, and opened fire directly on his position. How the hell were those things tracking? He fired, using the flashes of energy to target in on the soldier’s face. It took three shots before the creature twitched and sto
pped firing. A high-pitched shriek built as sparks coalesced before the soldier’s face. Light and energy flared. Seaghdh shielded his eyes.

  When he could look at the creature again, its face was gone, blown away by some force from within. Swallowing hard, Seaghdh forced himself to his feet and struggled into a jog after Ari.

  Two soldiers advanced on her. In seconds, they’d be within weapons range. While he was close enough to fire on the soldiers, his angle was wrong. He couldn’t help her.

  “Turrel!” he shouted.

  He spotted movement behind Ari. Then Seaghdh heard it, V’kyrri coaching Ari over the com channel, directing her. He shoved his aching body into a sprint, letting V’kyrri’s words guide him.

  The trees thinned. Huge, craggy fingers of rock stood, poking up through the forest floor, as if replacing the trees. Seaghdh wove and dodged, desperate for a glimpse of Ari and her pursuers. She couldn’t have gotten far.

  “Down!” a male voice bellowed.

  Seaghdh flung himself behind a stone finger. Belatedly, he realized he recognized the voice. Flashes of weapons fire and another high-pitched shriek confirmed that Turrel had found them at last.

  “Captain!” Turrel’s dread-laden tone brought Seaghdh instantly around the rock, racing toward Ari and the last soldier.

  The creature had cleared weapons range and trained its gun on Ari. Seaghdh’s heart leaped into his throat.

  Ari stood rigid, facing the last soldier as he stalked her. The look of horrified recognition in her face stabbed ice through Seaghdh’s stomach.

  “Lieutenant Heisen!” she commanded. “Stand down!”

  CHAPTER 11

  AS the remaining soldier drew closer, Ari felt as if her heart was being ripped a centimeter at a time from her chest. Once upon a time, that thing had been Tommy Heisen, a junior crewmember under her command. He’d piloted her shuttle when they’d been captured. She’d always hoped the unfailingly cheerful lieutenant had met a clean death. Looking at the misshapen hulk the Chekydran had turned him into, she wondered whether anything remained of the young man she’d known.

  “Lieutenant Heisen! Stand down!” Ari repeated, desperate to reach through that obscene armor, past everything that had been done to him. He had to still be in there. Somewhere. He had to. Or she was dead.

  “Tommy,” she said, putting on her best “the captain is speaking” tone, hoping military conditioning could break through. She willed him to hear, to understand. “It’s Captain Idylle. I need you to think, Lieutenant. We were captured. Do you remember? Fight them. Don’t let the Chekydran win, Tommy.”

  He wavered. The barrel of his gun drooped.

  “I need your help, Tommy,” she pressed, latching hold of the crewman she imagined was trapped inside the monster’s body. “I can’t survive without you. Fight them. Don’t make me tell your mother that the Chekydran won.”

  He stopped, struggle evident in the visible tremor in his limbs and in his tortured expression.

  Ari heard movement behind her and saw Seaghdh maneuvering for a clear shot. She ignored both to focus on her lieutenant. Her breath coming in short gusts, she approached him, aware that programming could reclaim him at any moment.

  “Good man, Lieutenant,” she said, staring him in the eye, not knowing if he could even see. “You’re doing it. Remember. I need you to remember who you are.”

  Ari knew the moment Tommy Heisen broke through the Chekydran programming. Something snapped and she felt him break free like a swimmer rising from deep water. She saw him suddenly appear behind those milky eyes. His terror and despair leaped out at her. Pain lodged in her chest, stealing her voice.

  He screamed and collapsed to the ground, his arms covering his head.

  Shaking, she dropped to her knees in the dirt and put a hand on his shoulder.

  “Gone,” he cried, quaking. “They’re gone. Can’t hold.”

  “You did it, Tommy. You beat them,” she said. “Thank you.”

  He sucked in an audible breath and drew his arms away from his face to look at her. The fear slipped from his eyes. She could almost see him smile. It felt like a kick to her gut.

  “Kill,” he whispered.

  A hard, bitter knot swelled in the center of her chest. “Yes.”

  “Here.” He lifted his chin.

  “Rest, Lieutenant,” Ari said. “Rest.”

  He reclined into the leaf mold and soil, his expression serene, trusting.

  She tucked the muzzle of the Autolyte under his chin, making certain the gun didn’t actually touch him.

  “Tell?” the man’s voice cracked.

  She squeezed her eyes shut, then forced them back open, despite the burn. “Tell who? Your family? Yes. I can do that. They will be proud of you, Tommy. I know I am.”

  A single tear escaped down his cheek. She choked on the tears she couldn’t shed and pulled the trigger.

  Ari shook at the rage and hatred coursing through her. Rational thought retreated. She ached to destroy Chekydran. Any Chekydran. Her vision hazed. She heard her breath coming in ragged rasps as she struggled to remember where she was, who she was.

  “Ari?”

  She knew that voice trying to reach her from so far away, but then one of them touched her. Growling in outrage, she struck center mass, hard. It fell away, crying out in pain when it fetched up hard against a solid surface. She sprang to her feet, crouching, waiting. Where there was one, there were more.

  “Back away.” Another voice. It, too, felt familiar.

  “What is it?” the first voice wheezed. “What’s happening to her?”

  “A flashback. She is very dangerous.”

  “Want help, Captain?”

  “No,” a sharp retort. “Back off.”

  Chekydran talking strategy. Her lip curled. Did they care that she’d learned to understand them? Leaves rustled. She lashed out again to have her blow blocked and her wrist wrapped in a hard grip. Fury, sharpened by an edge of panic, took possession of her. She exploded, biting, kicking, hitting, and shrieking.

  “Damn it, Ari! Stop it before I put you over my knee!”

  Something, the desperation, the anguish in that voice, pierced the primitive flood of fight-or-flight chemicals fogging her brain and she knew him. Seaghdh. She slumped and uttered the filthiest single word she knew.

  Gingerly, arms closed around her. She felt him nod.

  “Yeah,” he said.

  “Sorry,” she rasped.

  “I’ll live.”

  Her eyesight cleared and she found herself looking at Tommy Heisen’s body. She shuddered. Seaghdh’s grasp tightened. How could she have recovered so quickly? It couldn’t be Cullin Seaghdh. She wouldn’t let it be. If she became dependent on his presence, on him, she’d be as much a prisoner as she had been aboard the Chekydran cruiser.

  “Ari,” he rumbled, resting his forehead against her hair. “I’m sorry. If you’d given me a few seconds more, I would have spared you . . .”

  Ari twisted out of his arms, shoved herself to her feet, and plastered a thoroughly regulation expression on her face. “Don’t coddle me, Captain,” she said. “He was my crewman and therefore my duty. No one else had the right.”

  Blotting blood from his mouth with the back of one hand, Seaghdh nodded.

  She’d done that to him. Guilt raked her.

  “At least you didn’t break his nose, Alexandria,” a familiar male voice said from behind her.

  She turned, hardly daring to believe she’d heard right. “Augustus.” A sore spot in her heart eased.

  The man who’d once tempted her to stay on Kebgra grinned at her. The memory felt old, like it had happened a very long time ago.

  “I am relieved to see you safe,” he said. “You will want to bury your crewman, I take it? Shall I take the rest of your men below? Or do you wish to tend to your Chosen’s injuries yourself?”

  “He . . .” She stopped short and glanced at Seaghdh as he climbed to his feet, shooting a speculative look first at Augie
, then at her. Was that jealousy in his eye?

  Seaghdh. Her Chosen. Honest mistake. One she’d have to let stand while they were on Kebgra because Seaghdh wasn’t going to let her out of his sight regardless of cultural mores.

  “Thank you, Augie,” she said. “I would like to bury Tommy, but shouldn’t we get shielded? I can’t risk exposing you or the other survivors.”

  “My people engaged the mother ship and are in pursuit,” Seaghdh said. “They have other things to worry about than sending in more soldiers.”

  She nodded and slid a glance at Seaghdh. She owed the man an apology at the very least for injuring him. He couldn’t help it that she responded to him. Or could he? Just how far could he imbed compulsion when he used his vocal talent on someone? Did she care? For the first time in six months, she felt as if she’d reclaimed a lost part of her. Damn if she wasn’t starting to crave his brand of therapy.

  Ari put a hand on Seaghdh’s arm. “I’d like help burying him. Would you be willing? I’ll patch you up when we’re done.”

  His expression lit from within as he closed warm fingers over hers and she realized what she’d done. For the first time, she’d reached for him of her own volition. The golden fire in his eyes and the tantalizing caress of his thumb on the back of her hand drove fierce, pointed want straight through her core.

  “He was a good man, Captain,” he said. “Just show me where. Turrel?”

  Surprise lit through her. Turrel? He and V’kyrri should still be en route. She realized the big man lounged against a tall, thin standing stone, watching with a neutral eye.

  “The boy fought off the Chekydran when the chips were down,” Turrel replied. “He deserves a proper send-off. Count me in.”

  She carried the oversized and outdated mobile teleport unit that would dig the hole for them. Seaghdh and Turrel dragged the corpse to the makeshift graveyard Augie and his handful of survivors had been using to inter the few settlers’ bodies they’d been able to recover so far. Once she’d programmed and activated the noisy teleport console, Ari removed her ship’s badge from her pocket and tucked it inside Tommy’s armor.