The Better Part of Valor

by Tanya Huff

“Yes.”

  “They can get us out!”

  No room for doubt, in spite of explosions and alien technology. Marines didn’t leave their own behind. “Yes.” He still had hold of her shoulders. She shrugged to remind him.

  “Okay.” Ryder took a deep breath, wiped his palms on his thighs, and started pacing again. “Okay,” he said again, a little more calmly. Then he frowned. “What’s Morse code?”

  “A primitive communication system the anal retentives in the Corps have dragged through the last four centuries.”

  “Why?”

  Easy answer. “For situations like this. I need you to get down on your hands and knees.”

  Ryder looked startled, then he grinned, blue eyes gleaming even brighter amidst the unrelieved gray. “What?”

  “They can see us; that message is aimed at me. They’re probably scanning energy sigs with one of the engineering units. The PCU in my helmet has a noticeable signature.” While Ryder connected the dots she’d given him, Torin flipped up the microphone and took off her helmet. “If I hold it under your body, they can’t see it. When I bring it out again, they can.”

  “Visual tapping.”

  “If you like.”

  * * *

  “These vibrations aren’t doing the scanner any good,” Johnston grumbled as a sweating Guimond stopped pounding and the gathered Marines waited for a reply. “And we don’t know that she can hear us.”

  Nivry glanced up from the scanner’s display and frowned at the engineer. “A few more minutes.”

  “There’s a good meter between the top of the staff sergeant’s head and the ceiling. What’s she going to do to answer, stand on the civilian?”

  The corporal ignored him. “Guimond try a…wait, something’s happening.”

  Crouching, Johnston fiddled with the scan. “Looks like the thermal signals are joining.”

  “Now we know who the civilian is,” someone snickered.

  “Sig for the helmet PCU keeps disappearing and reappearing. There.” He pointed. “Now you see it, now you don’t.”

  “She’s answering.”

  “Well, if she isn’t, I’d like a closer look at what they are doing.”

  * * *

  The tapping changed.

  “Sounds like they got your message.” Craig shifted his weight from one knee to the other and back and tried not to think about how ridiculous this had to look. “What’re they saying?”

  “Give me a minute, Mr. Ryder, it comes through one letter at a time.”

  The situation had clearly stabilized if she was Mr. Rydering him again. He had to hand it to the Marines, they had an interesting idea of a stable situation.

  * * *

  Air lock gob? No, gone…Torin reminded herself to send an apology to the gunny who’d taught communications back on Ventris. Who knew I’d ever actually need to use this crap?

  When Ryder rose up onto his knees, she put a hand on his shoulder to stop him. He twisted out of her grip, the muscles across his back tight enough to march on.

  “I need you for a few more minutes.” She slid the words between the letters being pounded out above.

  “No, I’m done…”

  Torin understood his desire to do something, to not sit by and wait passively for rescue. Unfortunately, his options were limited, and if he started pacing again, she was going to have to break both his legs. “I can’t do this without you,” she reminded him.

  “I don’t…”

  The tapping stopped.

  Protest cut short, he looked up at the ceiling, then back at her, one corner of his mouth curling up. “Well?”

  “Air lock’s gone and the shuttle with it. And they’ve lost Captain Travik.”

  “Nice to get some good news with the bad.” He stared down at his hands resting on his thighs and, exhaling with some violence, abruptly dropped forward. “What are you going to tell them?”

  Torin forced herself to concentrate as he arched his back. “To look for another clean bit of floor.”

  * * *

  “Found it.”

  Marines and the second scanner converged.

  After a moment, Harrop straightened. “Nivry, ditch the small talk and tell the staff sergeant we’ve found Captain Travik and what could be another civilian.”

  “Could be?”

  “Heer’s reading five small separate sigs beside him.”

  * * *

  “Four meters on the other side of that wall?”

  Torin rocked back on her heels and stood. “That’s what they tell me.”

  “On, that’s just fukking great!” Ryder surged to his feet. “He might as well be four fukking kilometers away.” He threw up his arms and spun around. “There’s no way we can get to him. There’s no way he can get to us. And even if your people up top had cutting tools, they couldn’t get to us, so…” A thick finger jabbed toward Torin. “…don’t bullshit me that they can because structural components around here don’t seem to want…” He shouted a word at each wall. “To. Be. Fukked. With.”

  Settling her helmet back on her head, Torin walked forward. An arm’s length from the wall, she paused and shouted.

  By the time the noise faded, Ryder was at her side, arms folded. “What did you do that for?”

  “No echo. When you were yelling, there was bounce off every wall but this one.” Torin took a deep breath and stretched out her arm, holding her hand a steady centimeter from the wall’s surface. Before she could think too hard about what she was going to do, she took a step forward. Her hand disappeared.

  “Are you insane?”

  “Could be.” Given how much she wanted to scream, she wasn’t going to rule it out.

  Ryder grabbed her forearm and yanked. Nothing moved except a couple of small bones in her wrist.

  She took another small step, and he snatched his hands away as her forearm disappeared.

  “You’re fukking kidding, right?”

  Breathing heavily through her nose, she shrugged. “This seems to be an exit.”

  “It’s a wall,” he growled. “I’m staying right here.”

  They locked eyes for a long moment. Torin looked away first and shrugged again. “Suit yourself. If you change your mind, you know the way out.”

  “Take a deep breath.”

  Her heart was pounding so violently, she hardly heard him but she managed a smile. “No shit.”

  She’d intended to keep her eyes open, but at the last second, she closed them and threw herself forward.

  It wasn’t as bad as the first time but only because it was over a lot faster.

  Momentum slammed her into another wall.

  The bounce dropped her into a defensive position. A fast check confirmed everything working and no gear lost in transit.

  Adrenaline buzzing, eyes flicking from point to point, she looked around. Another corridor, but no more than a meter and a half wide and the walls appeared to be made of welded steel. Stranger still, the welds were rusting. The same ridged black rubber used for traction in most station docks covered the deck. Strips in the ceiling emitted cold white light not quite strong enough to reach into the corners, throwing the first shadows Torin had seen on the ship. About a meter to her right, the corridor ended in a blank wall, but it continued another six, maybe seven, to her left before ending in what seemed to be an old manual hatch.

  If she was under surveillance, it wasn’t registering.

  If she was in danger, it wasn’t obvious.

  The knife went back in her boot.

  So where’s a thousand Silsviss trying to kill you when you need them?

  The great thing about an obvious danger was the option of fighting back.

  The wall she’d come through was the same welded steel as the rest. Just as rusty. Just as solid.

  Ryder came through a little faster than she had. Hit the steel a little harder. Took a swing at her on the way down.

  Given the circumstances, Torin let it pass.

  “What took you so
long?” she asked, holding out a hand.

  He hesitated a moment, breathing hard, then took it and let her help him to his feet. “Why so relieved? You think I wouldn’t follow?”

  She hadn’t been sure. She’d seen the inside of his ship; he spent a lot of time alone in a small space, so it didn’t take much to work out the reason for the pacing he had been doing in the cube. Two people in that small space and the ship runs out of resources a lot faster in an unforgiving environment. Having her in that cube with him had to have been working against years of survival conditioning. No wonder he’d been on the verge of panic. Given a choice between being alone in the cube and forcing himself through after her…

  If he’d been one of her Marines, she’d have ordered him through and trusted training to overcome panic. As it was, she had to count on the fine Human tradition of not wanting to look like a coward in front of a crowd.

  One shoulder lifted and fell. “You said you were staying.”

  “I changed my mind.” He glanced down at their clasped hands, pulled free, stepped back, and swept the area with a disdainful gaze. “Oh, this is a big fukking improvement.”

  “There’s a door.”

  Torin watched the tension go out of his shoulders as he turned. “Now, we’re getting somewhere.”

  “It might be locked.”

  “I have a way with locked doors.”

  “No doubt.”

  “We seem to be heading in the general direction of your captain.”

  “Convenient.” And it was. Torin began to have a distinct sense of déjà vu.

  “Door looks low-tech. This looks like an older part of the ship.”

  “This looks like an entirely different ship. And if these walls are actually steel…”

  * * *

  “Corporal Nivry, this is Staff Sergeant Kerr. Acknowledge.”

  The silence was sudden and absolute as the staff sergeant’s voice rang out over the group channel.

  “This is Nivry.” She could hardly hear herself over the shouting. “You disappeared off the scanner; first your signal, then Mr. Ryder’s.”

  “We left the cube.”

  “How…?”

  “We went through the wall. We’re now in what looks like a low-tech area and are advancing toward Captain Travik’s position. Report.”

  “Harveer Niirantapajee has regained consciousness, but Gytha, the Katrien, is still out. We’ve patched up what damage we could see, but no one’s really up on Katrien anatomy. The mess kit’s still working; we’re running everything edible through into field rations and we’re bagging body parts. Most of the science team was at ground zero and there’s not much of them.”

  “Careful with your labeling, then.”

  It got a bigger laugh than it would have under better circumstances.

  “We’ve found four intact HE suits, and Heer and Johnston were checking to see that the air lock can attach another shuttle.”

  “Were?”

  “We’ve got both scanners pointed at the floor.”

  “Point one back at the air lock, but keep the other on Captain Travik. We may need directions. See what can be done about boosting our comm signal—the sooner the Berganitan knows we’re alive, the better.”

  Nivry stepped back as Johnston moved to reclaim his scanner. “We’re on it, Staff.”

  “Good work. I’ll check in when I’ve found the captain. Kerr out.”

  “She went through the wall,” the engineer muttered as the exoskeleton took up the strain. Straightening his legs, he announced to no one in particular. “Sergeants and above, out of their fukking minds.”

  * * *

  The hatch was locked. Ryder had it open before Torin snapped her mike up. She raised a hand to stop him from charging through and motioned for him to stand by the door, ready to slam it shut, while she checked the immediate area for unfriendlies.

  He ignored her.

  Which was when she remembered he wasn’t a Marine.

  It was a little too late to do it by the book, so she followed him through the hatch and stopped short.

  If she hadn’t known better, she’d have sworn she was standing in a dirtside warehouse. The kind that took advantage of the fact that the real estate came with an atmosphere and so there was never any need to clear the old crap out to make way for the new. Light levels were low, creating a shadow maze around the stacks of crates and pieces of equipment. The perfect location for an ambush.

  She glanced at her sleeve. If her sensors were right, nothing was moving. They’d find out soon enough if her sensors were wrong.

  “Holy fuk.”

  Ryder’s voice held significantly more fear than that situation called for.

  “What is it?”

  “I’ve been here before.” When Torin turned toward him, his eyes had nearly disappeared under the depth of his scowl. “It’s Customs Storage 23 at Port Julion.”

  Environmental controls weren’t enough to stop a chill from sliding down Torin’s spine. “Dirtside warehouse?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Dimensions, lighting, even the fukking shipping crates are in the same place. Except that.” Ryder pointed toward a familiar box of gray plastic. “That sank with us. Our backs were right up against it. So, why did it land way over here when we got dropped inside the magic cube?”

  “Good question. Here’s a better one. My guys said it was just over a meter between their floor and our ceilings—a straight line from where we sank up there to where we ended up down here. But we were in darkness for just over thirty-one seconds. What else happened while we were in transit?”

  He stared at her for a long moment. “Thank you for sharing that. You think the ship pulled this place out of my head?”

  Torin shrugged. “Got a better answer?”

  “And the corridor outside?”

  “That could have come from either of us—it’s pretty much a generic piece of old station or ship, but…” Again, she reached for the benny that wasn’t there. “We’d better hope they decided to stick with what’s in your head.”

  “And why would that be, Staff Sergeant?”

  He sounded insulted. Tough. “Ever been in combat, Mr. Ryder? Trust me, I’ve been in places I don’t ever want to go to again. Captain Travik should be over that way. Come on.” Moving carefully around blind corners, she’d covered about half the estimated distance when the shriek of protesting hinges spun her around. Holding the lid up with one hand, Ryder was about to reach into a red octagonal case with the other. “What are you doing?” she snarled.

  “This case was never in CS23. If the ship put it here, I want to know what’s in it.”

  Torin closed the distance between them with three quick strides, slamming the lid down with both hands. “Are you out of your fukking mind?”

  Breathing heavily, staring at his hands as though surprised they were still attached, Ryder snarled, “My salvage, Staff Sergeant. Don’t forget it.”

  “Alien technology, Mr. Ryder. Quite possibly the same technology that’s blown up once already. Anything you find will mean squat if we’ve been blown into greasy smears on the deck. Touch as little as possible. Open nothing.” Lips drawn back off her teeth, she leaned toward him. “Am I making myself clear?”

  He leaned in as well. “At the risk of sounding childish,” he growled, his breath warm against her face, “you’re not the boss of me.”

  “True.” She held her position, their eyes locked.

  After a long moment, Ryder jerked away. “All right. You win. I open nothing.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Yeah, yeah, you’re welcome.”

  He stayed close on her heels after that, which was, she supposed, an improvement.

  They found Captain Travik in an open area, one arm bent at an impossible angle, a triangular flap of skin peeled back over one eye and still bleeding sluggishly.

  The five thermal points beside him turned out to be the muzzle, hands and fe
et of Presit a Tur durValintrisy—her fur too thick for the scanner to read body heat.

  “And the day just keeps getting better,” Torin sighed.

  * * *

  “Berganitan, this is B7. We’re at the air lock and it’s a mess. Looks like there’s pieces of the ship missing and pieces of the shuttle still attached. I can’t tell if parts are melted or melded.” Frowning at the wreckage, Commander Sibley brought his Jade in closer. “Sending visuals and data stream now. You want my opinion, we’re not going to be using this entrance again, and if the internal damage is half as extensive, I doubt there’s anyone left alive.”

  EIGHT

  It took seconds to seal Captain Travik’s head wound. As she could do nothing about the triangular dent in the bone beneath the laceration, Torin ignored it. Familiarity with impact wounds suggested the explosion had flung a piece of debris at his head, and had he been anything but Krai, he’d have lost the top four inches of his skull. As it was, his med-alert had gone off, marking him for med-vac, so there was definite brain damage behind the dent.

  Brand new damage, Torin snorted silently, turning her attention to the arm.

  Grateful that the captain remained unconscious—for her sake as much as his—Torin took a deep breath, then gripped his arm above and below the joint, slowly straightening it.

  “I heard Krai bones were too tough to break,” Ryder said quietly, his hands working nearly wrist-deep in Presit’s fur.

  “The bone’s not broken; the joint’s been shattered.” She frowned down at the information on her slate and shifted her thumb until she felt something move beneath it. “The pieces are in roughly the right position, but he’s going to need internal fusing to hold things together.”

  “And until he gets it?”

  “We do the same thing we usually do.”

  Ryder snorted. “Because this sort of thing happens all the time?”

  “Injuries are a side effect of battle, Mr. Ryder.” Releasing the captain’s arm, Torin picked up her slate and added the new data to his medical file. A moment later, his sleeve tightened, then stiffened, holding his arm immobile at a ninety-degree angle. “The main function of MCCUs—combats,” she added at Ryder’s expression, “is to keep the wearer alive. The fabric’s got a dozen or so functions built into it.”