by Blaze Ward
Rob was just going to have to burn his suit later. All the blood splatter was never coming out. Plus, he never wanted to be reminded of tonight. This was the first time he had ever had to actually shoot someone in his career, a painful failure of his training and charm.
He growled under his breath.
Twenty-six more men were aboard Valencia del Oro when it lifted than when it had landed. Rob was actually pretty impressed that all of them had managed to make the launch window when the signal arrived out of the blue in the middle of the night.
But then, he and Jorge had picked these veteran soldiers after Roxy had set the minimum range score acceptable.
The ship backed onto its lifters and slowly adjusted. Rob assumed Raef was lining the bow up before things got crazy, but you never knew with her. He had sat and hooked a seatbelt anyway. The others had, too, as soon as they saw him.
Fourteen of them were in the room with him here, including Nigel, with the rest stuffed into the two empty cabins for launch. The room was packed with adrenaline and macho, but Rob was the only one with dried blood on his face. Wasn’t his, and he had specifically not wiped it off, just so these men immediately understood the situation.
Valencia del Oro stood on her ass and probably broke ever flight regulation 6940 Draconis had on the books, but he really didn’t care. Best outcome, he would never set foot in this system again, let alone on this planet.
Still, one more step in the plan complete.
Raef rode the engines hard. Somewhere in the vicinity of three and a half gees, standing on the engines. People didn’t even talk because she had shut down the internal gravity and left them pressed against the aft wall of whatever cabin or seat they were in.
Didn’t take long to get altitude at that burn. Raef rotated the ship back flat again after an hour by turning the grav-plates back on. They were still going up, but not at a mad dash now, so there could be some comfort.
“All hands, we will rendezvous with the carrier in forty-five minutes,” Raef announced like it was a cruise ship or something. “You are now free to move about the designated chambers. Stay out of engineering, the bridge, or anyplace else you think I might shoot your sorry asses.”
Yeah, Raef was a little miffed at having to haul so many people. But there was no quicker way to get off the planet and up to Queen of the Borders. They would have had to send a cargo tug and transport box down and equip it with enough life support to do the job. Something they had planned for later.
“Raef, am I on shipwide?” Rob asked casually, hearing his voice come bouncing out of the speakers.
She didn’t bother answering.
“Everyone come to the kitchenette now,” Rob said in a tired, angry voice.
The rest of his goon squad emerged and made their way aft fast enough. And Rob had forgotten that Longbow had brought guests as well. Jorge had told him, but Rob had lost it in the chaos of activating his troopers and getting to the ship.
Longbow first, followed by two women Rob didn’t know, but night and day in height, beauty, and coloration. Three other men followed, so Longbow’s cabin must have been crowded. The kitchen space was standing room only, and Rob had had a long day. Night. Experience.
“A little over four hours ago, a team rescued me from a group of folks that had wanted to ask some ugly, personal questions,” Rob pitched his voice to carry to the band as well as the soldiers. “The bruise is mine, but none of the rest of the blood.”
He paused to study everyone around him. Nigel always smelled like cordite, and now, so did Rob.
“We’re going to change up the mission some from the original thing you were hired for,” he continued. “If you feel the need to back out, I’ll pay you for time, but not hazard pay, because I’ll be leaving your ass up on the mothership when the rest of us do the mission.”
A growl emerged from the room. No words, just a challenge. None of these men were likely to back out or back down. They were just reminding him.
“The folks who captured me also sent a message to the place we’re going to hit, which is why we’re in a hurry,” Rob growled back. “We can outrun the message, so they won’t know we aren’t there delivering pizzas.”
That got a laugh.
“Once we’re aboard the mothership, you will not talk to the crew, mostly because we’ve already got the two pods configured as troop transports and they don’t have space for forty extra crew,” Rob said. “Hopefully, none of you will be terrified of sleeping on air mattresses for a few nights.”
More laughter.
Rob had studied the way Jorge did this. Even watched a few of the man’s movies so he could crib the mannerisms and inflections.
Why learn from anybody but the best?
“What about us?” Longbow called over the heads of the soldiers.
“My understanding is that the third transport pod has been set up as a studio, within limits,” Rob replied. Longbow knew this, but obviously hadn’t shared everything with his team. “You’ll have a week to yourselves, but you’ll have to bunk in there for the most part. Again, lack of space.”
And two of the only four women aboard either ship right now, plus Raef and Roxy, who he wasn’t worried about.
“What’s the operation, sir?” one of the older man close by asked.
“Originally, we were going to pull a con,” Rob said with a smile that must have looked wretched, from the way folks reacted to the dried blood. “Sail up and pretend to have suffered a navigation failure that required mechanical assistance. Use that to drop you onto the surface of the moon, from which you would Trojan Horse those bastards.”
“And now?” the man followed up.
“Jorge and Mrs. Jones will be leading a rapid assault, with you being organized into two teams,” Rob said. “Like the script I talked about, but we’re doing this in one take with live weapons.”
“I’m sorry, sir,” the soldier had a pained look on his face. “Did you say Mrs. Jones would be leading one of the teams? Does she even know how to shoot?”
Rob laughed so hard he cried before he could get his breath under control.
“All this blood on my face?” Rob asked the man. “There were three people alive in the room when her team blew the door, killing the man by the door and leaving another one in a side room for Jorge to shoot as her Entry Second. She killed all three of them herself with quick bursts while I was tied up and about to be executed.”
Slightly stretching the truth, but only because Roxy wanted a prisoner that Rob killed.
“She’s that good?” the man was aghast, but he looked like a local. One of the people that didn’t think girls were dangerous creatures.
“By herself, she could probably kill three-quarters of you,” Rob said.
“Oh, Rob, stop exaggerating,” Roxy’s sultry voice filled the room. “Remember, I set the minimum Hogan’s Alley score for those boys to even be invited. That number was my average score. At my age, I could probably only take out two-thirds of them before somebody got lucky.”
The casual way she said that, in that voice that was the wet dream of every boy who had ever heard it, and many of the girls, just seemed like frosting on the cake at this point.
Rob stood up and scowled mightily at them.
“I owe these bastards a ration of pain,” he said simply. “You’re going help me collect on a debt. Any questions?”
There were none at this point.
Go in and kill some people.
Just like pirates.
24
Longbow made his weary way forward, making the gravity transition from the neck of the mothership into the transport pod that was, for now, a commune and recording studio. Not a particularly great studio, as those things went, but they’d been able to hang some blankets and position some gear to get a pretty good concert hall reverb going, once they moved the microphones around.
The forward end was the personal space, with bunks and a portable head that had been stolen from somewhere and i
nstalled here long before Jorge Royo came along. Probably for people smuggling, if you put enough boxes down at that end.
It gave them privacy. But it also isolated him and the band, so every face was turned his way when he got the hatch opened and entered.
“Grab chairs,” he announced in a tired voice.
They had been recording like mad. Really, like folks possessed by literal demons for the last several days. On top of that, regular planning sessions with the team and all the extras that had been hired.
Naomi slid a mug of fresh coffee into his hands as he planted his butt and drew a heavy breath.
“Okay, we’re at the point where everything has to be on the table,” Longbow said, studying faces around him. The rest were a little stir crazy, but that was the life of the touring musician. Too long in too cramped a space with constant practice and being in people’s pockets all the time. Nothing new.
“From here, things will get a little messy,” he continued. “We don’t know how far behind us the alert message is, so we’re going to come out of JumpSpace as hot as we can and go straight to the assault. Jorge thinks they aren’t going to be at military alert, so their first warning might be shit blowing up.”
“What’s our role here?” Naomi asked.
She had turned into the speaker for the rest, even though it probably should have been Alicia. But Naomi had brought the rest of them in, so it was still her gig.
“You have nothing to do,” Longbow replied, fixing her with a tired smile. “I’ll be with one of the assault teams.”
“Really?” Naomi asked, obviously both concerned and confused.
“So there’s a lot the rest of you don’t know,” Longbow blew out a breath. “And didn’t need to know. And maybe still don’t. Jorge needs to know, though, so I have to ask.”
He paused, looking for the right words. It was hard. He did other people’s words, like an actor, rather than his own. Naomi’s most recently.
“I can tell you more, but then you’re on the inside, and you can’t really ever get back out,” Longbow continued. “You can leave, but people will watch you for the rest of your lives, and come after you if you talk. That’s the kind of trouble brewing. I think we’ve got a good thing here, and would like to turn you into a touring band and maybe do more than one album, if we can make it work. But there will be people with guns, and you can probably never go back to 6940 Draconis again after this. At least with your current identity.”
They were silent. Probably shell-shocked, but that was fine. Nobody was immediately demanding to be let off this ride. At least they knew how crazy it might get before it was done.
“So you have to decide right now,” Longbow continued. “If you’re all in, I can tell you more. If any of you aren’t then nobody finds out until much later.”
One by one he went around the group. Alicia nodded, but she saw a bright future where this album made her rich and catapulted her into the big leagues of record producers, especially after Levi made some calls to some folks. Pepe just nodded. Dutch smiled, but the old man had already been everywhere and seen everything, and probably didn’t figure he had that many years left to worry about looking over his shoulder either way.
Wolfgar scowled hard. Took Longbow’s measure. Then the rest of the group. Finally turned to Naomi.
“You good?” he asked her.
Wolf had known her the longest. And been her first call when Longbow asked.
Naomi nodded to the man.
“I’m in, man,” Wolfgar exhaled.
Naomi had as serious an expression as Wolf, but she was looking for something more than the rest of them were. For them, it was just an extended gig. A tour that would probably make them a lot of money and put them into a new circle of craft.
“I want more,” she said quietly.
“I can’t write,” Levi replied “I can play, and entertain, but that’s about it. I need a partner, but that’s going to be a hard road. That’s why there hasn’t been one before. Didn’t know anybody tough enough to survive it.”
“And you think I can?” she asked carefully.
“I do, but you’ll be stuck with me at that point,” he said. “All the craziness you’ve seen and heard is nothing on the real story, but if you’re in, you’ll have to know everything, eventually.”
“I’ve got time to learn it,” she smiled at him.
Levi sighed.
“Thank you,” he said. “Here’s the part you’ll never believe.”
So he told them about the traffic accident that nearly killed him. The time in the hospital. Learning to walk again. Talk again. Play again. The second career as a medic, since he had already spent so much time learning how his own body was rebuilt.
Jorge Royo and the Service. That got a round of gasps, as the implications of him being a spy sank in. Levi didn’t go into any detail, other than to explain how many missions he had done for Jorge, for Handsome, and for other folks.
“A traveling band is just about the best cover there is,” Levi concluded. “Lots of gear in big boxes that only get looked at perfunctorily. Oversized personalities distracting folks from the real game. And we’re rock stars, so everyone’s fawning over us constantly.”
“And Handsome Rob is a spy for Lincolnshire?” Naomi asked in a tiny voice.
“We all are, now,” Levi let his gaze roam about the group.
They had signed up for crazy. Now they were beginning to understand the scope of things.
“So what about us?” Alicia asked, encompassing the rest of the group.
“I’m hoping I can convince you to stay on as band manager, in addition to engineering goddess and backing vocals,” Levi smiled. “These three don’t want any adult responsibilities.”
He pointed at the boys, who all smiled back. Levi didn’t really want adult responsibilities, either, but he could fake it appreciably well.
“You and Naomi can be in charge of things, and we’ll handle the musical end of the equation.”
That brought a smile to Naomi’s face. And a second smile she and Alicia shared. Probably a promise of all the trouble they’d get into.
Levi didn’t bother telling them that they would both get to go through something like an abbreviated Field Agent school if they were really in. He’d survived it. Handsome and Jorge and Roxy had thrived. Wolf, Pepe, and Dutch would just have to sign confidentiality agreements with really rough damage clauses.
It was almost like joining a Salonnian Syndicate and becoming a made man, when you got right down to it. But Levi could see the album taking shape under Alicia’s hands. Longbow had caught a cultural zeitgeist to the point that it was in the top three selling albums of all time on more planets than he could count.
This new thing wasn’t going to repeat that, but it was a better story. And would probably make them all rich.
Levi just wanted to play.
“So, we’ve got three days to nail it down,” Levi announced. “Then the assault. I don’t wanna be dead, but if I am, at least you’ll have something to sell. Next week, we’ll be going to Lincolnshire and inventing new lives, so plan accordingly.”
They all would be. Even one used-up, nearly forgotten rocker.
25
Handsome Rob wondered if they’d be able to hire Queen of the Borders for some sort of extended, semi-official thing when they got back, just so they could actually film parts of the movie with Captain Kedzierski playing something more of an anti-hero turns golden role. Rob already had a good idea in his head how to set up a rogue Tactical Officer as a double agent, although in real life, she had been following orders.
Never let the truth get in the way of a good story. Casting would be a bitch, so they might have to go actually get a real actress, and coach her into the role, since Queen didn’t have any female crew. But just having Rodderick Kedzierski’s growl down as things got tough and ugly would sell tickets, according to Jorge.
Rob hadn’t bothered learning too many names on this ship. He, Jor
ge, and Roxy were in the Captain’s office with the man, while the First Officer, Giles Rodriguez had the bridge. The only two others present were Hachiro and Ganesh, the two team sergeants that had emerged from training and meetings.
Everyone called them the Lucky Twins, since Hachiro meant Eighth Son, which was considered luck, and Ganesh was the ancient, Hindu god of wisdom and luck.
Soldiers and sailors were equally superstitious.
“You’ve done this sort of thing before,” Kedzierski accused Jorge as Rob watched impassively.
Jorge took a sip from his ever-present, ever-full martini glass. Seriously, how did he manage that?
“If we had access to the old library, I’d show you the movie I made ten years ago, Captain,” Jorge purred magnificently. “Almost exactly this ending, except we had to go in and rescue a space princess before the villain could arrive to marry her and ruin the woman’s reputation and defile her purity. Strong Hindu overtones in that one.”
Jorge said that last to Ganesh with a smile.
“And you think we’ll be able to just land and waltz right in?” The captain wasn’t convinced.
“If the message hasn’t arrived, I think they’ll be more relaxed about things,” Jorge said. “We come out on the back side of the moon, launch the two tugs with boxes, with the third one flying escort. We swoop in low, come over the horizon at full speed, and land right in the middle of the landing field, where they can’t shoot anything big at up without hitting their own fighters and gunships, parked up on the surface. Two teams blow the gun tower and the flight control tower. After that, we can either capture everyone as prisoners, or keep blowing shit up while Handsome and Nigel film everything.”
“And me?” the man growled.
“If he doesn’t have ground or air defenses, I expect you might be able to sail right overhead at an absurdly low altitude for a mothership, blasting away with your big guns. Same with the tugs. When was the last time Queen of the Borders got to be the Goddess of War, Kedzierski?”
