Battle in the Belt (Stark Raven Voyages Book 3)

by Jake Elwood

  "Right," said Chan, trying to shake a sense of unreality. "Prudent."

  The bridge doors hissed open and Liz and Joss came through. Chan turned. "So. There's a prisoner in the ventral lock. Let's get her out of there before the docking tube connects. We'll put her in an empty stateroom." He gestured at Liz. "You can guard the door. Right before we leave we'll dump her in the docking tube. By the time she can complain to anyone we'll be fifty klicks from here and still accelerating." The two women gaped at him, and he made shooing gestures with his hands. "Go. Go! The docking tube will connect any second now."

  He watched as Liz and Joss levered a woman in a black vac suit out of the little airlock. The woman seemed dazed, slumping between them as they helped her into the nearest cabin and draped her across a bunk. Liz and Joss returned to the corridor and the door slid shut behind them.

  Metal clanked against metal beneath their feet as the docking ring connected.

  "Right, then," said Marcus. "I'll see you shortly." He stepped into the lock, standing knee-deep in the little enclosure. "If anything…" His voice trailed off. "Well, I really appreciate what you've done for me. You helped my people when you picked up the survivors from Iscariot, but that's nothing compared to what you've done for me personally. I want you to know I appreciate it."

  "Don’t get all emotional," Liz muttered. "You're back in fifteen minutes, remember?"

  He nodded, then knelt and fumbled with the lock controls. The outer hatch opened and he hung by his hands, lowering himself until all they could see was his knuckles. A moment later he dropped from sight.

  "We need a horizontal docking ring somewhere on this ship," Liz said, and swung the inner hatch shut without latching it. Chan returned to the bridge, the others following.

  Rhett still sat at the helm station. He waited until the bridge door closed, then said, "Has Mr. Marcus left the ship?"

  "Yes." Chan felt his pulse quicken. "Did you …"

  "I examined the package he acquired from Mr. Piotr, yes. It contained several kilograms of industrial explosive. There was also a detonating device with a crude timer."

  Blood roared in Chan's ears. "Why—" He stopped. He knew why Rhett hadn't spoken up earlier. Chan's instructions were clear and explicit, and Rhett had followed them precisely. Be discreet. Let me know what you found as soon as you can without Marcus knowing. And this was no time for questions like "Why." The answers wouldn't help him cope with this crisis.

  "We should call station security," said Joss, and dropped into a seat. "They can intercept him."

  "Wait." Chan held up a hand, his mind racing. "What if he sets off the bomb as soon as he knows he's caught?" He pictured bodies tearing and burning, the skin of the station rupturing, the survivors ripped out into vacuum. "If one of us can reach him, maybe we can talk him down. He doesn't want to kill us, right?"

  A shrill voice in the back of his head told him to undock the ship and put some serious distance between himself and this cursed station. He suppressed the voice ruthlessly. Once before he'd given in to fear and shirked his duty. He still woke up in a cold sweat sometimes. His current burden of regret was all he could bear. He wouldn't add to it.

  "What do we do?" The trust in Joss's eyes warmed him even as it made him want to scream. She honestly expected him to know. "It's a big station. Maybe if we split up—"

  "We need to figure out where he's headed," Chan said. "Is it a suicide bombing? Is he going to plant a bomb and run back here? What if we just refuse to leave? Maybe he'll have to disarm the bomb, if he can't get away from it."

  Would the duffel bag contain enough explosive to destroy the station? Chan doubted it. He twisted in his chair. "Do you have any idea where he—" He stopped. "Where's Liz?"

  Chapter 7

  The Chapel of Christ Risen had doors that appeared to be actual, honest-to-God wood. Liz laid her fingers against the glossy surface. It was warm to the touch, mostly smooth but with a hint of roughness that corresponded with the light and dark stripes of the wood grain. A veneer, she decided. The door would be metal or plastic with a covering of wood barely thicker than her own skin. No one would ship actual wooden planks this far from Earth. It would be madness.

  The word echoed through her skull as she pushed the doors open. Madness. Madness. Madness. Marcus, with his warm brown eyes and his easy smile, was in the grip of madness. How else did you explain what he was about to do?

  A low creak of hinges made her wince, but Marcus seemed not to be there to hear. The chapel was empty, the interior shadowed. A giant cross decorated the far wall, the wood grain a bit less convincing. The ceiling was high, a dark airy space that almost let her imagine a benevolent God lurking somewhere above. Long pews of dark metal lined either side of a central aisle. There was an altar under the cross, decorated with purple cloth.

  She moved toward the altar, stepping as softly as she could. She told herself it was because she didn't want to startle a mad bomber, and that was part of the reason. The other part was that the ambience of the room was getting to her. It felt … solemn in here. Sacred. The very air was heavy with ritual. She could dismiss this particular religion as superstitious nonsense, but the room demanded obeisance. It demanded respect.

  Step by cautious step she moved through the room, her hand going to the butt of the laser pistol at the small of her back. It felt wrong, blasphemous, to bring a weapon into this holy place. She planned to use it, too. She gave the gloomy ceiling an apologetic glance. Surely it would be much more wrong to do nothing and allow a bomb to splash these hallowed walls with blood.

  When she was close to the altar she saw Marcus's foot. He was behind the altar, holding himself quite still. She stared at his foot, at the familiar blue moccasin he'd been wearing when he saved her from an ugly encounter with a bully back on Xiao Station.

  He'd be wondering who was there, hoping it was a worshipper, hoping whoever it was would say a quick prayer and leave. He was going to be disappointed.

  She stopped half a dozen paces from him and slid the pistol from her waistband. For a long silent moment she questioned herself. Was she certain it was him, and not a clergyman kneeling in prayer or searching for a dropped contact lens? Her eyes took in a trailing bit of red thread on the side of his moccasin, something she'd first noticed as he climbed into Piotr's ship. It was Marcus, all right.

  Well, was there any chance he was here on an innocent errand? She gave the question serious thought. He was in the house of worship of a sect he didn't belong to, a sect he blamed for the bombing of Iscariot. He was hiding behind an altar with a bag of explosives. She tried to imagine some benign purpose. Her imagination failed her.

  She took careful aim at the altar, estimating where his torso had to be. He could be kneeling, leaning, or on his hands. The laser would burn through the flimsy altar like so much paper. He would be dead in seconds. She wouldn't even have to see his face.

  Cold-blooded murder just wasn't in her, though. Not for a man who'd been a friend and a lover. She weighed her options, then shifted her aim to his foot and pulled the trigger.

  Marcus screamed, and a little corner of her mind heaved a sigh of relief at the familiar sound of his voice. It really was him.

  His hands came into view, clutching his smoking moccasin. His familiar, sturdy hands that had caressed her, hands he'd raised in her defense back on Xiao. She thought about firing again, burning off a few fingers to make it harder for him to fight back. She couldn't do it. His hands were too beautiful to destroy.

  He writhed around until his head and one shoulder were in view. His face was bright red, his teeth tightly clenched as he snarled, "Liz! What the bloody hell are you playing at?"

  She trained the barrel of the pistol between his eyes. "I might ask you the same thing. Since I have the gun, why don't you answer first?"

  Some of the anger left him. She caught a flicker of shame in his eyes, but it gave way to righteous indignation. "I'm fighting for my people. I'm striking back!"

  "You
're killing random worshippers, you idiot!"

  He glared at her, the charming rogue she'd liked so much completely gone. "You don't know what it's like to be persecuted," he spat. "To see your people hounded and hunted. Murdered. You never saw Dorado, but you saw what happened to Iscariot. You were there!" The rage eased slightly, and a shadow of the old Marcus shone through for just a moment. "I know you understand how I feel, Liz. You don't let people push you. You push back."

  She found herself nodding in agreement. It was no good letting the universe step all over you. You had to stomp right back, or things just got worse and worse. Then she stopped nodding. "You're an idiot, Marcus." She waved her free hand at the church behind her. "Do you think the asshole who bombed Iscariot will be at the afternoon service?"

  "It doesn't matter!" The fanatical gleam in his eyes told her she was wasting her breath. "Fundamentalists attacked my people, and fundamentalists will pay the price."

  She made one last attempt. "You're hurting your people now, Marcus. You're teaching the whole solar system that the Church of Judas really is evil. Evil and dangerous. Iscariot's going to be just the beginning. Unless someone stops you."

  When he moved it was so sudden, so unexpected, that Liz was caught flat-footed. He rose, took a single hopping step, and dove through a doorway beneath the big hanging cross. Liz found herself staring stupidly after him, her pistol pointed at the empty air beside the altar where his head had been.

  Then he leaned around the corner, she saw the dull shape of a pistol in his hand, and the altar trembled as a round slammed into it. She swung the pistol over, much too late, and raked a laser beam through the doorway to let him know she was still on her game.

  She glanced at the altar. From the point of view of Marcus's doorway it was several feet to one side of her. He wasn't trying to hit her, not yet. He was just letting her know he was armed and willing to pull the trigger. She glared at the dark doorway, wondering how far he could get. It looked like a glorified closet, a storage room for whatever religious claptrap the holy men needed to store.

  "Give it up, Marcus. You won't get your revenge today. You can blow up the two of us and give the fundies a good laugh. Or I can shoot you. Or you can put the gun away and come out."

  His voice floated through the doorway. "I'm willing to die for a cause, Liz."

  She opened her mouth to argue, then closed it. Talk wasn't going to work on him. Joss might manage it. She'd have him convinced there was a congregation from the Church of Judas praying somewhere just inside the blast radius. She'd have Liz half believing it too. It was scary what that woman could do with nothing but words.

  Liz, though, had a skill set oriented more toward physics than semantics. She wasn't going to persuade Marcus of anything. There was too much conviction in that hidden voice, too much righteous virtue. He believed in his mythical view of himself. He believed, and he truly was willing to die.

  What must that be like? To throw away everything you have, everything you are, for a stupid delusion? Her gaze lifted to the cross above the doorway, and she shivered. So many worshippers, using belief as a source of hope, of strength, of community. And an idealistic young madman using belief to justify an appalling act of murder.

  She stared at the cross, wondering what to do and heartily wishing that she could believe in a loving, all-powerful savior watching over her. It would be a great comfort, right at the moment. She felt a kinship with the worshippers who usually filled the room. They were able to get across a mental hurdle that currently blocked her. They overcame their skepticism and reaped a rich reward for it. She envied them their comfort.

  Marcus, she realized, was locked in a similar pattern. He told himself he was a noble hero defending his people and righting wrongs. So long as he was able to convince himself, he could stride through his life free of doubt, of fear, of guilt. He could commit awful crimes and glory in his own virtue as he murdered.

  And what about you, Liz? What do you believe in? What would you die for?

  "I've got a bomb in my hand," Marcus called. "If I toss it through the doorway it's just enough to kill you, but it's not enough to kill me in here. If you start running right now, you'll live."

  "I can't leave now," she snapped. "I'm not done shooting you."

  He didn't answer. There was a blur of motion in the shadowy doorway, she caught a quick glimpse of his pale fingers, and a fist-sized object came sailing out to land on the floor near the corner. There was no time to think, no time to weigh consequences. Liz dove for the bomb, dropping her pistol as she sprawled across the floor on her stomach. Her outstretched fingers clawed for the bomb. She couldn’t have said what she was trying to do, tear the detonator out of the explosive, lob the whole thing into Marcus's closet, she didn't really know. Only as her fingers closed on it did she realize she'd been suckered. The "bomb" was lumpy candle covered in wax drippings.

  "Don't move."

  She turned her head. Marcus leaned against the storage room doorframe, all of his weight on his uninjured foot, a rail gun in his hand, the barrel unwavering, pointed at her. She was stretched full length on her stomach, the candle in her fingers. Her pistol was on the floor beside her, almost touching her knee. He wouldn't be able to shoot her more than eight or nine times before she could grab it.

  "I'm leaving." The passion was gone from his voice now. He sounded tired and hurt, but entirely determined. "I have a job to do, and I'm going to do it. No one is going to stop me." His brows lowered. "No one."

  Liz almost stayed silent. Words were useless against a fanatic. She couldn't stop him, but she decided she might be able to delay him. Even now, Chan and Joss might be spreading the alarm. Every second might count. "You can't do it," she said. "Where will you find your victims?"

  "They're in the cafeteria upstairs." With his empty left hand he twitched a finger toward the ceiling. "They always have lunch together before the service." The same finger waved to indicate the shadowy church. "I'd rather kill them here, but the cafeteria will do in a pinch. I'm afraid I'll have to lock you in here."

  This is the end, then. I tried my best. He's going to lock me in here, and whatever happens next, it won't be my fault. I did everything I could. These strangers he's going to kill are not my responsibility. I can't save them. I'm staying here, and my conscience is clear.

  Once again she failed to make herself believe. Cold fingers played across her skin. Ask a stupid question, get an answer you won't like. This is it. This is what I'll die for. This is what I believe. That he has to be stopped. That I can't stop him. That he'll kill me. That I have to try anyway.

  He straightened up, and she said, "Don't do this, Marcus."

  For a moment he paused, one leg bent to keep his injured foot off the floor, a hand on the door frame beside him. His gun was still trained on her. "Thanks for helping the Iscariot survivors," he said. "Goodbye, Liz."

  "Goodbye," she murmured, and took a deep breath. He took a hopping step, his hand letting go of the door frame and reaching out toward the nearest pew, and in that moment she moved. Her body arched, she got her knees under her, and her hand closed around the butt of the laser pistol.

  Marcus caught the seat back of the pew, the rail gun steadied, and she found she could see down the gap between the rails. She was an instant away from death, and he hesitated. Shooting a lover is not easy, after all, no matter what you believe.

  For nearly a second he stood frozen with the gun trained on her face, and in that second she swept the laser pistol up and burned him from hip to throat. The laser cut through his gun arm and the pistol hit the floor, his severed hand still gripping it, an instant before he toppled.

  She stared at him for a long moment, then squeezed her eyes shut and tucked the laser pistol into the back of her waistband. She rose to hands and knees, then opened one eye and kept her gaze fixed on her own two hands. She crawled forward, keeping his left leg in her peripheral vision. His left hand came into view, those wonderful fingers slack against the carpet
, and she closed her eyes and wrapped her fingers around his still-warm hand. It was easy to imagine that he was still alive, just relaxed, just sleeping. She knelt beside him, not looking at the terrible damage she had done, rocking gently from side to side as tears slid down her cheeks.

  "Oh, damn it, Marcus. I'm sorry. You stupid shit, why couldn't you just let it go?" She squeezed tighter, but he wouldn't squeeze back, and that spoiled the fantasy. Then there were the smells, burned fabric, burned flesh, offal. He was dead, and she couldn't pretend any longer.

  She turned her head away from Marcus before she opened her eyes. She found herself staring down the length of the long room toward the big wood-covered doors, which were ajar. A priest was staring at her, an elderly man in a long dark robe with his eyes and mouth open in horrified surprise.

  "Shit." The storm of emotion in her brain cleared instantly and the ramifications of her position came flooding in. A corpse. Two guns. A bag of explosives. And now a witness. She might, eventually, talk her way out of this, but it would take weeks. Possibly months. With fundamentalists, the Custer, and Solar Force all racing each other to come crashing down on the Raven like a hammer on a walnut.

  She let go of Marcus's hand and rose to her feet, keeping her eyes on the priest. She'd seen enough already to give her nightmares for years. She didn't need another glimpse of what she'd done to that strong, lean body.

  The priest backed out of the doorway as she hurried toward him. "Forgive me, Father," she murmured as she pushed past him and broke into a run.

  He wanted to die for the greater good. I granted his wish. Damn it, Marcus, why did you have to put me in that position? I should go back and shoot you again, you selfish bastard. She shook her head, trying to clear it. Focus, girl. Concentrate. You can get all emotional later. Right now you need to think.

  She was in the Jacob module of the station. It housed most of the station's seven or eight thousand inhabitants. The Edward module that spun in opposition was mostly industrial. Jacob was an irregular warren of tunnels and chambers carved out of the rock of the original asteroid. The floor beneath her was steel, the walls on either side rough stone, the ceiling a jumble of ducts and cables and anonymous plastic pipes. There were people everywhere, from grizzled spacers in jumpsuits and boots to girls in light dresses and low heels. They gaped at her as she ran past.