Haven 6

by Aubrie Dionne

  Was he stuck here forever? There was so much left un­fin­ished, so much he’d wanted to do.

  “Take me back!” he shouted to the pla­cid, un­car­ing sky. “I wasn’t fin­ished yet.”

  The rush of the rap­ids was the only muted voice an­swer­ing his pleas. Weaver kicked a rock, and it skipped across the clear wa­ters. He ran his fin­gers through his hair, tears rolling down his cheeks. His life had been so short and so full of hate. All those mo­ments he’d lost when he could have en­joyed him­self and those around him. What an ut­ter waste.

  I wish I had a chance to talk to Striver one last time, to tell him I’m sorry.

  Would Eri do it for him? He trus­ted her. If she suc­ceeded, she’d tell the whole vil­lage about how he sac­ri­ficed him­self to get her to the ship. Weaver closed his eyes, hop­ing she made it, hop­ing he’d helped someone for once in his life.

  His eye­lids fluttered open, and his father still stood be­fore him with both eye­brows raised in ex­pect­a­tion. Weaver had al­ways wanted to live free of Striver’s shadow. He’d fought for his father’s un­end­ing at­ten­tion. Now he had it. For the first time in his life, Weaver re­leased the pain and hate stored up in his heart. There was no place for it here, and he didn’t want to waste any more of his time on self-de­struct­ive thoughts. He had one more chance to make the most of it.

  Weaver put his arm around his father. “Let’s see how many trot­ters we can catch.”

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Delta Slip

  Eri’s heart sped as she dir­ec­ted Aquaria through the re­stric­ted cor­ridors lead­ing to the com­mander’s con­trol deck. She’d only been once be­fore, when the com­mander had asked her to join the ex­plor­at­ory team. Back then, she’d been a timid, in­ex­per­i­enced fol­lower, lack­ing con­fid­ence. Now, she stormed the cor­ridors as a battle vet­eran, ready to take over the ship.

  They reached the end of the hall un­detec­ted. They paused, catch­ing their breaths. Eri ex­ten­ded a mir­ror glued to a tooth­brush to peek around the corner.

  “Ten guards, all with gal­lium crys­tal void rays.”

  Aquaria turned the ring on her fin­ger over and over. “You’d think the com­mander would or­der them out to the bat­tle­field to help the oth­ers.”

  “Guess she’s not tak­ing any chances with her own safety.” Eri shook her head. They could have used those void rays on Jolt. Maybe then, Weaver would still be alive.

  Aquaria’s third fin­ger was turn­ing red. “It’s go­ing to be hard to con­vince them all to leave.”

  Eri put her hand over her sis­ter’s be­fore she twis­ted her fin­ger off. “Are you sure you want to do this?”

  Aquaria nod­ded. “I’m just think­ing out loud. That’s all.”

  “If this fails, we’ll both be branded as rebels.”

  “I’d rather be in a cat­egory with you and Litus, and save those poor people, than live on this ship in an ex­clus­ive so­ci­ety.”

  “Okay.” Eri pock­eted the tooth­brush and stepped into the doorframe of a stor­age unit, press­ing her back against the wall to hide. “Do your stuff.”

  “One more thing.” Aquaria squeezed her hand. Res­ol­u­tion shone fiercely in her oceanic eyes. “Do what’s ne­ces­sary to keep all those people, in­clud­ing Litus, safe. Okay?”

  Eri nod­ded, re­as­sur­ing her­self this act of treason, some­thing she’d never thought of do­ing in all her life on the Her­it­age, was war­ran­ted. She fought for Striver and his vil­lage, and their right to ex­ist. Fail­ure was not an op­tion.

  Aquaria took a deep breath and let out a spine-tingling scream. She winked at Eri be­fore scram­bling around the corner. Eri scrunched up against the doorframe, wait­ing for her cue.

  “Please, you have to come help. All of you.” Aquaria’s voice shook.

  “What’s the prob­lem, miss?” a deep bari­tone voice rumbled.

  “I’m Mrs. Muller.” Aquaria knew how to use her con­nec­tions to their ad­vant­age. Litus’s wife would have more cred­ib­il­ity than any un­known col­on­ist.

  “Oh, Mrs. Muller. I didn’t re­cog­nize—”

  “It doesn’t mat­ter. Some of the nat­ives snuck on the ship. They’re head­ing to the re­actor core.” Aquaria soun­ded so au­then­tic, Eri al­most be­lieved her for a second. All those times they played pre­tend as kids must have im­proved her plaus­ib­il­ity.

  The sound of thump­ing feet and buzz­ing guns echoed down the cor­ridor. “How many did you see?”

  Eri bit her nails while Aquaria paused.

  “Ten, maybe twenty.”

  Good think­ing, Aquaria. That will mean the whole bri­gade has to go.

  “Hurry!”

  “We’re on it, Mrs. Muller. Show us where you saw them.”

  “Come with me.”

  That was Eri’s cue. She waited un­til the foot traffic faded be­fore ex­tend­ing the tooth­brush mir­ror again. Two men had stayed be­hind to guard the con­trol room en­trance.

  Cy­ber­hell!

  Now it was up to her. Eri switched her laser gun to stun. After wit­ness­ing Weaver’s hor­rible de­mise on her ac­count, she didn’t want any more deaths on her head. These guards were just fol­low­ing or­ders.

  Tak­ing a deep breath, she thought about her next move. She only had seconds to shoot, and both shots had to be ac­cur­ate, or they’d re­turn fire. Check­ing their po­s­i­tions one more time in the mir­ror, she took a few deep breaths. You can do this.

  Aquaria could only keep the guards busy for so long. Eri tightened her grip on her laser. Now or never.

  She leaned around the corner and zapped the guard on the left be­fore he knew what hit him. He fell back against the wall and slumped. What she didn’t count on was the time it took her laser gun to re­charge. She pulled the trig­ger as the high-pitched buzz grew louder, but noth­ing happened. The guard on the right raised his void ray.

  She ducked back around the corner as a laser blackened the op­pos­ite wall. His gun is def­in­itely not on stun.

  It took all of her cour­age to throw her­self back out there, aim at his mid­sec­tion, and shoot again. This time the trig­ger worked. But this guard moved quickly. He ducked and rolled to­ward her, and her shot hit the wall be­hind him. She ducked back around the corner.

  Damn!

  Eri held her breath and listened. She’d grown used to the chirps of jungle birds and the rust­ling of leaves, so the si­lent still­ness made her un­easy. The guard breathed heav­ily. Plastic creaked, and clothes rustled. He was closer this time, and both of their guns had re­charged. It was go­ing to be a shoot-out, just like in those west­erns from Old Earth she’d stud­ied for lin­guist­ics jar­gon. Only she didn’t think she had the faster trig­ger fin­ger.

  Yes, but my laser gun is smal­ler. The trig­ger is faster. Maybe that’s enough.

  It had to be, or that void ray would turn her into burned toast, the com­mander would or­der the at­tack on Striver’s vil­lage, and they would all die. No pres­sure.

  Each second felt like tor­ture, her heart beat­ing wildly, her throat con­strict­ing un­til she fought for breath, her sweaty hands grip­ping the laser. At least it would be over soon.

  Eri turned, shot in the dir­ec­tion of the heavy breath­ing, and dove. She didn’t stop to see what happened, scram­bling across the open space for the other corner. She hit the chrome floor and rolled. Squeez­ing her eyes shut, she waited for sear­ing pain, but none came.

  I’m alive. El­bows throb­bing, Eri scrambled up and crouched against the wall. Her hand shook as she pulled out the tooth­brush and spied on the ad­ja­cent cor­ridor.

  The other guard was face down on the floor.

  Could he be play­ing dead?

  There was only one way to find out. She crept around the corner and aimed her laser at his back. He didn’t move. An­other stun might kill him if he was already out, so she had to be ca
re­ful. She inched to­ward him hold­ing the laser. He curled his fin­gers around the trig­ger of the void ray.

  Eri nudged his shoulder with the toe of her boot. No re­sponse. She slowly bent down, still hold­ing her laser, and yanked on the end of the void ray. His grip re­mained firm. Heart beat­ing out of con­trol, she reached over his body and pried his fin­gers loose one at a time. His hands were still warm, and his fin­gers felt fat and soft un­der her skin. Striver’s hands were hard and cal­loused. Guess that’s what liv­ing in the jungle will do.

  The weapon was heavy as all hell. Her wrist strained to keep it up, but a rush of re­lief came over her as she held both guns.

  After one more nudge with her boot, Eri stepped over him and gently kicked the other guard near the door. Both were un­con­scious. Stuns usu­ally las­ted twelve to twenty-four hours. She had time.

  Eri pressed the door panel and the screen beeped.

  IDEN­TI­FIC­A­TION RE­QUIRED.

  Panic shot down Eri’s legs. She looked around, but neither guard had an ID tag. Pre­cious seconds ticked away as she scrambled for an an­swer. On second thought, I shouldn’t have knocked them both out. She tried to re­mem­ber when she’d vis­ited the com­mander. The guard had stood at this very door and…placed his fin­ger on the screen!

  A fin­ger. She needed a fin­ger. Eri leaned both guns against the wall and hauled the closest guard to the door. Drag­ging a six foot man at five foot two wasn’t easy, but she wasn’t about to cut his fin­ger off. She raised his arm and plopped his fin­ger on the screen. The panel beeped.

  IN­COR­RECT IDEN­TI­FIC­A­TION.

  Cy­ber freak­ing hell. She didn’t have time for this. Eri lay the first guard down and dragged the other one. He was heav­ier, and sweat ran down her cheeks as she tried his fin­ger, hop­ing luck was on her side. The panel beeped again.

  AC­CESS GRAN­TED.

  Thank the Her­it­age the other guard who’d stayed be­hind had ac­cess. As the particles dis­in­teg­rated, she grabbed both weapons.

  The con­trol deck lay eer­ily si­lent and still in stark con­trast with the main sight panel, where the battle un­fol­ded be­low them. Eri rushed over and scanned the ground. No sign of Striver or Jolt. Litus and his team were work­ing their way to­ward the middle, along with the oth­ers from Striver’s vil­lage. Only two Law­less with lasers re­mained.

  The sight of their vic­tory brought a de­gree of tri­umph, but the joy faded just as quickly as it had come. This would give the com­mander un­lim­ited power. Eri had to tear her gaze away from the battle to avoid dis­trac­tion. “Com­mander Grier, I need to talk to you.”

  The pink tank of em­bryonic li­quid sat on a ped­es­tal at the room’s cen­ter, wires stick­ing into a fleshy brain. She stared at it, won­der­ing how aware the brain really was. Could it sense her pres­ence when she entered the room?

  The door so­lid­i­fied be­hind her. Pan­els rose from the walls and a low buzz­ing hummed through the room. Eri tensed. Did I just walk into a trap?

  The lasers shook in her hands. She tightened her grip as a mag­netic force from the pan­els pulled her guns from her fin­gers. She held onto the weapons as her hair clips yanked from her hair. The force in­creased, rip­ping both guns from her hands. They clunked as they hit the pan­els. Eri ran over and tried to pry them off, but the force was too strong. Hold­ing the guns, the pan­els lowered back into crevices in the floor. Eri scrambled on her knees, fin­gers dig­ging into the metal, but the crevices closed, and the chrome looked smooth as a newly pol­ished floor.

  “No, no, no.”

  The screen lowered in the cen­ter of the deck, and Eri whirled around. The com­mander’s sharp fea­tures flashed on, her eyes nar­row­ing. “Erid­ani Smith. You have failed to re­port back to me. I have re­lieved you of duty. You are no longer ne­ces­sary to this colony’s ex­plor­at­ory ef­forts.”

  Is that all she’s got? Did she not no­tice how I just took out her main guards? Sud­denly the com­mander didn’t seem so all-power­ful, and Eri’s cour­age boos­ted. She put her hands on her hips and stared her down. “I couldn’t care less about my du­ties. Let’s talk about Delta Slip.”

  “Con­sider your­self off the pro­ject. It is no longer your con­cern.”

  Eri voice hardened. “It’s my main con­cern, Grier. Those people down there are help­ing us win the battle. They have so much they can teach us, be­sides con­trib­ut­ing to our dwind­ling DNA pool. You know it’s in our best in­terests to keep them alive.”

  “Your opin­ions are un­war­ran­ted, Ms. Smith. Re­turn to your fam­ily cell and wait for fur­ther or­ders.”

  “I’m not go­ing any­where un­til you call off Delta Slip.”

  The com­mander’s eye­brows scrunched up. “If you con­tinue to dis­obey or­ders, I’ll have to charge you as a sym­path­izer.”

  Gears turned be­hind Eri, and she glanced over her shoulder. A ro­botic arm emerged from the wall along with a needle on the tip. She ducked and rolled across the floor as it swung at her. “I told you, I’m not go­ing any­where.”

  A second ro­botic arm dis­lodged from the op­pos­ite wall. Eri jumped side­ways as a ro­tat­ing blade sliced a lock of her hair. The arm with the needle jabbed be­hind her, and she fell for­ward be­fore it could pierce her arm.

  “It’s the as­sas­sin­a­tion at­tempt, isn’t it? Law­less gangs killed your fam­ily, and now you want re­venge.”

  The com­mander blinked like Eri’d hit her in the nose. Her vir­tual face blanched. It was the first time Eri had seen her vul­ner­ab­il­ity and a glimpse of her hu­man­ity.

  “People must have or­der to their so­ci­ety. Without rules, evil can mani­fest in phys­ical forms.”

  The ro­botic arms swung around the room and Eri scrambled to her feet, watch­ing them as she spoke. “Evil is here whether we have rules or not. Be­sides, this vil­lage has a so­cial struc­ture of their own. They’re not like the Law­less.”

  “They are des­cend­ants of the gangs who stole Out­post Omega, space pir­ates. I can’t have their re­bel­li­ous blood ming­ling with ours.”

  “These people didn’t kill your fam­ily. Their an­cest­ors, many, many years ago, did. You can’t hold them ac­count­able.” Man, talk about a grudge.

  Litus’s voice came on the in­ter­com, steal­ing the com­mander’s at­ten­tion. “Mis­sion ac­com­plished, Com­mander Grier. The battle is won.” Eri’s head snapped up. She side-kicked the arm with the blade as it dove for her leg. The needle hung over her head, and she jumped and grabbed onto the arc be­fore the tip could prick her. Dangling from the ro­botic arm, Eri hoped Litus had done the right thing.

  The com­mander’s lips stretched into a pleased smile. “Ex­cel­lent. I’ll send a team to hunt down the strag­glers. Com­mence with Delta Slip.”

  …

  The vil­la­gers cheered around Striver, throw­ing up their bows, drum­ming on the ground, and leap­ing to the sky. Carven and Ri­ley lif­ted him on their shoulders and the oth­ers chanted his name. The last of the Law­less scattered into the jungle, and they’d dis­abled every laser gun loaded with that golden sub­stance. He’d killed Jolt. The Law­less had no leader and their num­bers dwindled. They’d done it.

  Dis­be­lief and shock hit him in duel slaps. We’ve tri­umphed, but at what cost? Weaver was gone. Right now he was in sur­vivor mode, but when the truth sank in, grief would swal­low him whole. He still thought he’d see Weaver emerge from the forest like noth­ing had happened. It would take time to real­ize he’d never see his brother again.

  A sense of dis­quiet quivered in his gut, and he scanned the bat­tle­field ex­pect­ing one more man to run at them with a laser, or for Jolt to get back up as a blackened corpse and hunt them down. Everything looked in or­der; the col­on­ists lined up in rows, the people from his vil­lage ten­ded to the wounded, and the Guard­i­ans circled in the sky above. Maybe it was all of
the death around him send­ing anxi­ety through his veins. Death that in­cluded Weaver’s.

  No, this is some­thing dif­fer­ent, some­thing not yet re­solved.

  Had his mother’s psychic tend­en­cies got­ten to him, mak­ing him be­lieve he had an­other sense as well?

  He tapped Carven’s shoulders, and his friends lowered him down.

  “What’s the mat­ter?” Ri­ley shook his head. “We won.”

  “Did we?”

  “Give the man some room.” Carven pulled Ri­ley back. “Go tend to your sis­ter.” He mo­tioned to Riptide bandaging a cut on her up­per arm.

  “All right. But I think she proved today she can fend for her­self.” Ri­ley left with a pride­ful grin on his face say­ing, Look what you’re miss­ing out on.

  Striver didn’t care. His heart was too full of pain to cul­tiv­ate any more an­ger or an­noy­ance.

  Once Ri­ley left, Carven squeezed Striver’s shoulder. He looked worn, blood and dirt smeared across his fore­head, and a few more wrinkles now creased around his eyes. “I’m sorry about your brother.”

  Striver’s throat tightened. He could hardly speak. “It’s not your fault. He made his own choices.”

  “I’m sorry all the same.”

  Striver looked past Carven to where Litus stood in front of the ranks of col­on­ists. The un­ease in his gut grew so strong, he swal­lowed down bile. “Some­thing’s wrong.”

  “What’s the mat­ter?” Carven tensed be­side him.

  He trus­ted Litus. So what was the prob­lem? “I’m not sure.” Striver pushed by Carven. “Stay here and don’t say any­thing. Let’s not cause panic.” Men all over the place with weapons and death in their eyes were dan­ger­ous enough without as­sump­tions.

  As he ap­proached Litus he over­heard that fa­mil­iar term Delta Slip. Eri had never had a chance to tell him the truth. He should have asked her out­right, but he real­ized he loved her too much to push her away.