Shadow Agents

by David Alastair Hayden

  Siv Gendin

  “You are the stalling me,” Zetta said. “I am not pleased.” She waved the injector around dramatically. “Maybe I not give Kompel?”

  Siv had asked Zetta about the terms of the bounty, how much she expected to get paid, and whether she would accept a lesser offer from him. He had made increasingly ridiculous proposals that would allow him to escape or buy his way free, even though he knew she wouldn’t accept any of them.

  Having worked with Zetta before, though, he knew it was best to throw a lot of ideas at her all at once. She might be devious and good at killing people, but she got overwhelmed by information, especially information spoken in rapid Terran with a heavy Ekaran accent. And Siv was deliberately using a lot more accent than he usually did.

  The point of all this wasn’t to escape. He knew that wasn’t going to happen. He was just stalling to buy the others time to conclude that it was best for them to make a run for it before she could threaten to torture him or kill the miners. Because he felt certain they would cave and do what she asked. Or delay too long trying to find a solution and expose themselves to a third party.

  Siv’s eyes tracked the Kompel. Once the others flew off in the Outworld Ranger, he would make a move against Zetta. And she would kill him. He had no doubt. Her reflexes and aim were superb. But survival wasn’t the most important thing to him right now. He couldn’t let her win. He couldn’t let the Kompel win. So he needed to force Zetta to kill him.

  “Okay, I admit it,” he said. “I have been the stalling you. But those were good offers I made. I would gladly pay you everything I’ve got, give you inside knowledge about the Shadowslip, and work for you.”

  She shook her head. “Girl worth far, far more than you. We go to bridge now. I threaten kill miners. Friends surrender.”

  “They’re not going to give themselves up.”

  Zetta shrugged. “If miners no work, I think maybe they like you, surrender if I start hurting you.”

  “Sir, the others have formulated an assault plan.”

  “You were supposed to convince them to leave.”

  “And that worked as well as I expected it to, sir. It’s a solid plan they’ve got. That Bishop has a devious mind.”

  “Well, what’s the play?”

  “They’re going to drive the Tezzin in through the docking tube.

  Siv nearly flinched in surprise and admiration. That was clever. “I guess he’s already checked to make sure it will fit?”

  “Indeed, sir. I should have thought of it as soon as I studied the freighter’s specs. I guess I need to work harder on my car-based attack strategies. Okay, they’re nearly ready. I told Bishop to make a lot of noise to distract Zetta.”

  “Tell them to focus on rescuing the miners first. No distraction’s going to be good enough for me to reach her. And if forced to, she’ll just shoot me. Ultimately, I'm expendable.”

  “I think I have best plan now, though,” Zetta said, sneering. “You give them over.”

  Siv scoffed at her. “Hardly.”

  “But I give you Kompel. Let you go. Tell Shadowslip you dead.”

  “Not happening,” he said, salivating at the thought of the Kompel rushing into his system, quelling the withdrawal.

  “Maybe I even tell you how Kompel made. Where comes from. You get all you want, yes?”

  “You…you know where it comes from? How it’s made?”

  "You give over friends. I give secrets. You go free. I promise. You not have bounty. They think you dying soon, maybe not bother paying to have back."

  “Sir, I have a plan for beating Zetta, and it could work if she’s distracted even a little. When I tell you to, deploy your shield and leap forward. As fast as you can. Try to get a little air under your feet, too. Okay?”

  Siv stared at her. “You know how the Kompel is made? You swear?”

  “Why lie when I own you, yes?”

  “Sir!”

  “Wh–what?”

  “Get ready. On my mark lunge.”

  “O–okay. Sure. Whatever.”

  “Sir, she’s lying! You know she is. You can’t trust Zetta. She’d kill her mother for a credit.”

  “Of…of course.”

  He steeled his courage. If he let Zetta get to him, then that would mean allowing the Kompel to win. He couldn’t give in to it.

  An engine roar followed by gunshots reverberated through the ship. Then came more gunfire. Zetta flinched, turning her head ever so slightly toward the sound.

  “Now, sir! Go!”

  Siv was staring death in the face, a gun barrel aimed between his eyes. The moment of truth had arrived. And he would beat the Kompel, no matter the cost. He activated the force-shield, raised his arm, and lunged forward.

  As the force-shield’s energy disc erupted through the spacesuit’s arm, two things he had not expected happened. First, Silky activated his antigrav, setting it to seventy-five percent. Then the air jets on the back of the spacesuit fired at full blast.

  Zetta’s eyes flicked back to him. She fired her heavy blaster. Had he still been on the ground, and not a half-meter up, he would not have had the force shield up high enough in time, and the shot would have struck him in the neck. Instead, the shot fired into the top of his shield.

  Siv crashed into her, knocking her back and pinning her against the wall. She coughed and shook her head as if dazed.

  The suit’s propulsion jets sputtered out.

  “Her gun isn’t DNA locked, sir.”

  Siv rammed his right shoulder into Zetta’s chest, then with both hands he grabbed her gun, getting a hold despite the thick gloves he was wearing. Twisting, he wrenched it free from her grasp.

  Before he could spin back around, she kicked him in the back.

  “Shield up!” Silky shouted.

  Siv fell into a crouch and turned, raising the shield. Zetta’s force-blade clashed against it, sparks flying as it unleashed a concussive shockwave. The impact sent a bruising numbness down into his arm.

  He lifted the blaster to take a shot, but Zetta had already withdrawn her blade and was making a low stab with it, forcing him to lower the shield. He blocked that attack as well, and again the impact sent a deep ache into his joints.

  “Force-shield at twelve percent, sir.”

  She pulled back quickly and did a backhand slash. He couldn’t get the shield up in time, so he ducked his head beneath it. The blade passed just above him, causing his hair to rise and the skin of his scalp to tingle.

  Knowing she would be out of position as she recovered from the slash, he surged upward, lifting the blaster. But she hadn’t readied herself for another attack. She had used her momentum to spin all the way around and make a dash for the door, ducking and weaving.

  Siv fired the blaster. Not used to a heavy pistol, it kicked in his hand. His shot sailed just over her shoulder. He fired again, but she was already through the door.

  Damn, he’d forgotten how fast Zetta could move.

  Siv lumbered forward. He was never going to catch her, especially in this bulky suit. But the others might still need his help by the time he reached them.

  Just as he neared the door, out of the corner of his eye, he caught sight of the Kompel injector lying on the floor. He paused.

  “Sir, she’s heading toward the others.”

  Siv stepped toward the abandoned injector.

  It was still intact.

  “Sir, you can come back for it.”

  He stood transfixed. What he wanted most of all was lying right there on the floor. There was no one to keep him from getting it. He could take an injection, and he wouldn’t have to fight the withdrawal anymore. It was right there, and it would be so easy.

  “Sir, if you catch her, you can interrogate her. Maybe she does know how it’s made.”

  Siv fell to his knees and grabbed the injector, cradling it in his hands like a fragile, baby bird.

  “She doesn’t know. I’m sure it was all a lie. But this…this is real.” />
  14

  Kyralla Vim

  Heart pounding, stomach cramping with anxiety, Kyralla climbed into the backseat of the Tezzin. She took the right side while Mitsuki took the left. They had to kneel awkwardly inside since Bishop had ripped out the seats to prepare the skimmer for an overhaul. He had also removed the windows.

  Kyralla placed her plasma pistol on the floorboard and wiped her sweating palms dry. She tried to focus and take deep, natural breaths, but she couldn’t stop the mad rush of thoughts charging through her brain.

  For the fourth time, she checked that her expandable force-staff was still secure in its sheath on her back. Realizing she was distracted, she tried yet again to center her mind. Her forewarning ability was useless if she couldn’t stay in the moment.

  Mitsuki appeared calm and relaxed beside her, but she already had years of experience. Kyralla had spent thousands of intensive hours in the combat simulator, but she had already learned that training just wasn’t the same as live action. On top of that, most of her training had focused on the defensive tactics she would need to protect her sister, with little time devoted specifically to assault missions like this.

  Bishop hopped in and grabbed the wheel.

  “It still works, right?” Mitsuki asked.

  “The engine does,” Bishop replied. “And the shields.”

  “That’s all we need,” Mitsuki said.

  Bishop turned the car around and drove it toward the back of the ship. “Everyone ready?”

  Kyralla picked up her plasma pistol, swallowed hard, and nodded. “Let’s go.”

  Mitsuki patted her on the shoulder. “Relax. You’ve got this.”

  “I’m just a little nervous is all. I haven’t been in a real gunfight before.”

  “I have faith in you,” Mitsuki said. “I mean, until this week, you had never piloted a starship through a space battle before, and that turned out fine, right?”

  Kyralla replied with what she hoped was a confident nod.

  “Ship, open the door for docking access,” Bishop requested.

  A docking tube had extended out from the freighter and locked onto the Outworld Ranger’s hull. A plasma window matching the interior of the tunnel was then deployed from the freighter, and air pumped inside. The plasma window alone was sufficient for accessing another ship, but most people preferred redundancy when dealing with the vacuum of space.

  Under normal circumstances, the boarding ramp in the back of the Outworld Ranger would have remained closed, while an iris in its center opened to match the diameter of the other ship’s docking tube. But the mining freighter was set up for transferring cargo and other equipment using antigrav sleds and forklifts. The tunnel they had deployed was larger than the entire back door of the Outworld Ranger, giving Bishop plenty of space to drop the boarding ramp and drive the skimmer car through.

  The boarding ramp retracted into the ship, leaving only a blue shimmering plasma window between them and the tunnel.

  “Ship, extend our plasma window to match the interior of the docking tube,” Bishop commanded.

  “I cannot project our plasma window into the freighter’s,” the ship replied.

  “Reduce the diameter of our window by one percent.”

  “Plasma window extended,” the ship responded.

  “Now we’re protected on the way back,” Bishop said, “in case things go wrong and we have to retreat.”

  “Ship, once we’re through, retract the boarding ramp,” Mitsuki added. “And don’t let in anyone except the three of us or Siv.”

  “Good idea,” Kyralla said.

  Inwardly, she cursed herself. She should have thought of that since it would keep Oona safe if something happened to them.

  Bishop slammed the car into drive. "Hold on!"

  The skimmer's propulsion engine whined as they zoomed through the fifteen-meter docking tube at breakneck speed. The freighter's loading bay was nearly big enough to hold the Outworld Ranger itself, but at the speed they were going, they’d cross that space in mere seconds.

  “We’re going too fast!” Mitsuki yelled.

  "It's an ambush!" Bishop called back as if that explained his behavior.

  Red dots representing the four Star Cutter thugs popped into Kyralla’s locator, along with tiny symbols denoting their armaments. One carrying two plasma pistols stood just off to the side of the docking tube, waiting to ambush them from behind when they entered. One with an assault rifle was perched on a catwalk in the back. And two with plasma carbines hunkered behind crates in the middle of the otherwise empty bay.

  The Tezzin burst through the tunnel, and Bishop drove straight toward the crates in the center. All the thugs opened fire, but their shots bounced harmlessly off the skimmer’s force field.

  The two behind the crates barely had time to react. One dove aside, but the other, perhaps stunned by their tactic, stupidly stood his ground and kept firing. The car plowed through the crates and smacked into him. His broken body somersaulted across the bay and struck the far wall. Blood streamed down the force field as a dot disappeared from Kyralla’s locator.

  “Oh shit!” Bishop slammed on the brakes and cut the wheel hard. “Brace for impact!”

  As the car spun, the tail end clipped the thug who had dived aside, knocking him several meters away.

  The Tezzin crashed against the far wall. The force field flickered but held. The impact threw Kyralla against the door, and her head thumped into the window frame. Mitsuki was tossed against her, and one of the wakyran’s bony elbows jammed hard into her ribs.

  Stars swirled through Kyralla’s vision as the car bounced several meters back out into the bay then slid to a stop. As she gasped for breath, Rosie’s voice rang out in her mind.

  “Madam, I’m detecting a possible rib fracture, along with heavy bruising, a cut on your scalp, and a minor concussion. Nothing major or seriously debilitating. Your mind should clear in a moment.”

  Blood trickled down the left side of Kyralla’s head. She tried to wipe it back into her hair so that it wouldn’t get into her eyes, but she ended up making things worse. The impact had been just above her chippy socket, luckily sparing Rosie from damage. Without Rosie, she'd be lost.

  “The others?”

  “They are alive and whole, madam. Do you want me to inquire as to—”

  “Don’t bother them.”

  “It’s a good thing Mr. Bishop didn’t remove the car’s inertial dampeners.”

  She couldn’t disagree. Without the dampeners, she would probably be unconscious with a few broken bones…or maybe worse.

  Mitsuki groaned as she sat up. “You okay?”

  Kyralla nodded. “Banged up a bit. Got a light concussion. You?”

  “The same. Bishop?”

  “I’ll live,” he murmured from the front seat.

  “You’re never driving again,” Mitsuki spat.

  “Fair…enough,” he replied. “It was my…first time.”

  “Damn it, Bishop,” Mitsuki said. “You should’ve told us.”

  “S…sorry.”

  “How are the shields?”

  “Holding at fifty-seven percent, madam. For now. We’re still being attacked.”

  Kyralla shook her head, trying to bring herself out of her current dazed state. She finally noticed the flashes of plasma striking the car's shields and heard the loud pops overhead. She glanced around, checked her locator, and accessed the car's cameras.

  Barrels overheating as he pumped out shots, the thug with the pistols advanced toward them, while the one on the catwalk above had slipped the barrel of his rifle through the grating, to unleash a hail of explosive rounds, each one dropping the force field by five percent.

  “We’d better do something quick,” Kyralla said.

  Mitsuki nodded then winced. "On my mark, focus the shield upward and open a shot for me to the side."

  "Right," Bishop groaned, wiping the blood from his face.

  The thug with the pistols stopped fi
ring, either because he'd overheated both guns or had burned through their power packs. He threw the pistols down and began to draw two more from his belt.

  “Now!” Mitsuki yelled.

  Bishop pressed a button and swiped a hand upward on the control panel. Then he slumped down into the seat.

  The moment the shimmer of the force field disappeared from the sides and intensified above them, Mitsuki opened fire with her carbine. She nailed the thug in the chest, and the two new pistols he’d drawn clattered to the floor.

  The one they’d clipped with the back end of the car sat up. One of his arms was broken, and blood dripped down his face, but he wasn’t too injured to fight. Despite being dazed, Kyralla “saw” the shots before he fired.

  She tugged at Mitsuki. “Down!”

  They ducked as white-flaring plasma bolts struck the side of the car, two passing right over their heads, through one window and out the other side. It was fortunate the Tezzin was armored.

  Explosive rounds continued to pound them from overhead, and the force field had dropped down to ten percent.

  A tight spiral of neural disruptor energy rings fired out from the front seat of the car and glanced the wounded thug’s shoulder. Given his injuries, it was enough to knock him out. Disruptor in hand, Bishop again collapsed into the seat.

  “Did I…get him?” he asked hoarsely.

  “Brilliantly,” Mitsuki replied.

  He muttered something about lucky shots then fell silent. Kyralla started to ask if he was okay, but the force field flickered then winked out. Seeing what was coming next, she shoved Mitsuki away. A split second later, an armor-piercing round punched through the Tezzin’s roof, zipped through the space between Kyralla and Mitsuki, and punctured the floor.

  “He’ll switch to guided rounds now,” Mitsuki said.

  Kyralla took a deep breath. “I’ve got this.”

  As Mitsuki hunkered down, Kyralla grabbed the door handle and calmed her mind. She needed to get the timing down perfectly. A second shot blasted through the ceiling of the car and tore through the seat a couple of centimeters from her leg.

  She threw open the door and hopped out of the car. As she had expected, the thug trained his rifle on her. Before she could draw a bead on him, he fired. She had practiced a scenario like this many times before. Seeing the round before it reached her, she rolled forward just in time. The round, unable to change direction that quickly in such a short space, blasted the floor.