Mercenary Courage (Mandrake Company)

by Lionsdrake, Ruby

  She rubbed her head, groaning at the idea of figuring out mercenary law. No, Garland might not be the best person to contact. Viktor’s second-in-command was usually running the ship during the nightshift, so she had not spent much time with him. She did not know him well. Someone else might be a better bet, someone with a tie to Viktor and also to her. Or at least to someone in her business.

  “Jamie?” Ankari asked. “Can you get in touch with Sergei?”

  “Of course. Is there something you want me to ask him?”

  “Yes. Does your stealthy assassin think he could sneak onto a secured and quarantined space station?”

  “From what I’ve heard,” Lauren said from across the room where she was dropping small pieces of an egg log into her rat box, “he’s been contemplating trying anyway.”

  “Because he’s missed the captain?” Ankari asked, though she knew that was not the case.

  “Because he’s missed someone.”

  Jamie’s cheeks colored, but she did not deny the statement.

  “The risks people will take to engage in coitus are mystifying to me,” Lauren said.

  Thinking of the elevator, Ankari’s cheeks colored, as well.

  • • • • •

  Viktor paced the brig, alternating between thinking and wishing he was better at thinking.

  Why did Fleet want him incarcerated? He could understand it more if they wanted him shot. Was it Admiral Petrakis specifically who wanted him, or had he, as the highest-ranking military man heading to the meeting, been given the task by someone above him? Viktor had never crossed paths with Petrakis and couldn’t summon an image of what he looked like in his mind. Mandrake Company stayed away from the military and never targeted their ships in its operations, but Viktor could still have killed some friend of the admiral’s or ruined some Fleet officer’s plans. It was possible one of the finance lords Mandrake Company had taken out had been tied to the military in some way.

  The letter that Ankari had acquired had said Captain Mandrake and the Albatross would be dealt with when the admiral arrived. Was it possible someone wanted his ship? Or wanted for him not to have his ship?

  He growled at the idea and paced faster. Did someone believe that with him gone, the ship might be taken? The crew inspired to mutiny and leave him? That was always a possibility in a mercenary outfit, but the last few months had been lucrative, despite the Nimbus debacle, because of the deals he had struck. Right now, Mandrake Company was receiving a share of Ankari’s business and also a share of the treasure-hunting business that Lieutenant Thomlin had left to join. Thomlin and his new female friend Kalish Blackwell apparently made an excellent team, because in their first month working together, they had unearthed the remains of one of the original twenty colonies, the one that had been lost when an asteroid struck the planet shortly after the colony ship had landed. Thomlin and Blackwell had uncovered valuable historical artifacts and were in the process of auctioning them, with Mandrake Company receiving a percentage of each sale.

  Viktor halted, a new thought lurching into his mind. “Thomlin. Of course.”

  During the mission where Thomlin had met Blackwell, Mandrake Company had helped them pull a couple of ancient alien spaceship engines out of a cavern system, along with a projector that produced far more realistic holo images than the current technology could manage. When the device had created a fleet of alien ships in the air, they had appeared real on the sensors, and Thomlin had said it had been possible to walk about on the hull of a ship that had been on the ground. Of course, the treasure hunters had needed to trade the device and one of the engines to Commodore Parsons in order to escape the Fleet’s clutches, but Viktor had insisted a schematic be made before releasing the projector. During the Nimbus fighting, his engineers had been too busy keeping the Albatross together to work on creating a physical version, but the information was still in the ship’s database.

  “Or maybe they’re after the engines?” he wondered.

  But Mandrake Company did not have either of those. Commodore Parsons had taken the one, and Thomlin and Blackwell had taken the other engine to sell. Viktor doubted either Thomlin or his new partner would have blabbed that Mandrake Company had kept a copy of the schematics for the projector, but he couldn’t rule that possibility out—he had only interacted with Blackwell a couple of times, so he did not know her well. It was also possible someone in her family had blabbed. Still, Commodore Parsons had the original device, so the Fleet should have access to that. Why would anyone care if a mercenary had a copy?

  Viktor stroked his stubbled jaw. “Unless... Parsons didn’t turn his goodies in.”

  Maybe he hadn’t even told his superiors that he had acquired them. Parsons might have known that the Fleet would not approve of the way he came by those artifacts. After all, he had allowed Blackwell, a criminal in GalCon’s eyes, and her ship to escape in exchange for them.

  “So, does Fleet even know Parsons has the devices?” Viktor murmured. “Or did Parsons imply that we had them?”

  Footsteps sounded in the drab gray corridor outside Viktor’s cell. He did not think much of them, since guards walked by in pairs frequently, but a familiar pair of faces came into view.

  “He’s only been incarcerated for a few hours, and he’s already talking to himself,” Commander Borage said. “That’s a sign of looming insanity, isn’t it?”

  Sergeant Azarov came into a parade rest stance at his side, hands locked behind his back, and said nothing. Fleet had doubtlessly taught him not to say anything derogatory about his commanding officer, not to his face, anyway. He did give the squinty eye to one of the tall enviro-hance trees that dotted the corridor, its leaves brushing the ceiling. He might have been reading the display on the pot that showed how much CO2 the tree was absorbing each hour. Or he might have been looking for spiders on the leaves. There was a web up in the corner of Viktor’s cell, but he had not received any visitors yet.

  “The company know I’m in here?” Viktor asked, ignoring Borage’s dig.

  The guards had taken his comm-patch, along with his jacket, belt, boots, and weapons. They had not allowed him to contact anyone before thrusting him into the cell, telling him they were too busy to follow all the protocols. He had watched as numerous men and women from the pet shop incident had been locked up in adjoining cells. By accident or design, the one across from him remained empty. Maybe Security didn’t want him conspiring with anyone.

  “I told Commander Garland,” Borage said. “Striker and Frog were lurking nearby, and they gossip like women playing Anchors and Asteroids, the drinking version.”

  “So the answer is yes, the company knows I’m here.”

  Viktor hadn’t intended to sound irritated or terse, but it must have come out that way, because Borage smoothed his wrinkled and coffee-stained shirt and stood taller, a more business-like expression on his face.

  “Yes, sir. We came to see if...” Borage glanced up the corridor, probably at some security guard outside of Viktor’s sight. “We came to see if you had any orders you wished to give us.” Borage widened his eyes slightly at the force field keeping Viktor inside the cell. Implying that he would plan a jailbreak if Viktor wished it?

  As much as he did not want to be in the exact place Fleet wanted him in when the rest of their ships showed up for the meeting, this wasn’t some minor mafia-run station held together by spit and rust. Some of the plant technology may have deteriorated without the druids here to monitor it, but Midway 5’s brig looked modern, with the guards appearing neither greedy or slothful. Breaking out would not be a simple matter, especially with the quarantine in effect.

  “One order,” Viktor said, shaking his head slightly at the force field. “I want you to do some research for me. Figure out where Commodore Parsons is right now, and see if you can find out if anyone has been scanning the Albatross or making any inquiries about her since we’ve been docked. Especially about her databases.”

  Borage nodded. “I know what
you’re wondering about, sir, and Azarov and I have already been doing some research. Well, I researched while he stood guard by the door to the library and looked threatening.”

  The fact that his men had been working pleased Viktor, though he was mildly surprised, given the rooms Ankari had generously purchased for them. “The library? I thought you would be in your luxurious room, ordering in fancy meals, fancy women, pedicures.”

  “Pedicures, sir?” Azarov blinked slowly a few times, then frowned down at his boots. “That’s the toenail thing, isn’t it?”

  “I was mostly hoping Borage would partake in that. Every time we spar on the judo mat, he claws me with those talons of his.”

  “I thought you knew that was my secret attack, Captain.”

  Yes, the scabs on Viktor’s shins proved it. “What did you find in the library?”

  Borage glanced toward the guard again, looking like he would have preferred to write up the details in a note and slide it through some bars to Viktor. Alas, one rarely found cells with bars anymore. “As soon as we learned that the Fleet had an interest in Mandrake Company, I assumed it was a result of our mission with the treasure hunter,” Borage said.

  He had assumed that right away? Viktor grunted and nodded for him to continue, trying not to feel slow for having taken a while to remember the alien artifacts.

  “I didn’t think to look up Commodore Parsons, but I did jump on all of the engineering news and rumor hubs on the network to see if the engines were being talked about yet. To say they are would be an understatement. There are schematics, some the fluff of people’s imaginations and others that appear legitimate, based on the small amount of data I was given.” A hint of hurt entered Borage’s eyes, as if Viktor should have ensured his engineers had been invited to Blackwell’s ship for a field trip.

  Viktor had been more interested in the holo-projector, since it might come in useful for his ship in the near term. Whatever happened with those engines, he was certain it would be years, if not decades, before the technology would be integrated into human ships.

  “The holographic projector was also mentioned on the various hubs,” Borage said, “but nobody had schematics or even pictures of it. The speculation was that Fleet had locked it down and was threatening to kill anyone who leaked information on it, but there are Fleet engineers that lurk on those hubs, as well—most of them are incognito, but I’ve been in engineering circles for long enough now to have sussed out some of the identities behind people’s handles. Those engineers were just as mystified as to where the device had gone. Some of them work at top-secret research facilities, so if anyone knew where the projector had been stored, it would be them. Of course, they could be feigning ignorance, but I did not get that sense. Some were quite agitated and offering rewards for leads.”

  “What kind of reward tempts an engineer?” Viktor asked, eyeing Borage’s rumpled clothes. His chief engineer was fastidious about investing and maintaining his retirement account, but he never seemed that motivated by money, material items, or pleasures of the flesh. The fact that he had been in a library instead of enjoying his luxury room spoke to that.

  “We like puzzles, clues to mysteries that haven’t been solved, tidbits of engineering history and artifacts.” Borage scratched his jaw. “My Lieutenant Howler was once wooed out of a considerable sum of money in exchange for a shower curtain woven with metal threads derived from a reclaimed submarine. There was lewd square-root humor cleverly threaded into the mesh.”

  “Lewd square-root humor?” the heretofore-silent Azarov asked, apparently finding this as puzzling as the notion of a pedicure.

  “It’s a cartoon. With equations whose answers spell out—”

  “The projector,” Viktor said, not certain how long visiting hour might last.

  “Er, yes. No one knows where it is, but everyone wants it. That’s what I was trying to imply, sir. If not the original machine, then a copy of the schematics.” Borage raised his brows.

  “And someone has figured out that we might have a copy?”

  “That I don’t know, but people have figured out where the artifacts were found—there’s been a frenzy of new mining claims registered for Karzelek. It wouldn’t take much for someone to learn that we were in the area at the same time as the alien artifacts were discovered.”

  “So, why target us instead of Parsons?” Viktor mused.

  “I don’t know, sir, but we’ll look him up, see what we can find.”

  A throat cleared off to the side, the security guard. “Time’s up.”

  “Of course,” Borage murmured. “Anything else we can get you, sir?”

  “No.” Viktor doubted the guards would let him accept cakes with files in them.

  “At least you won’t be tempted to break your no-sitting rule here.” Borage waved to the cell’s sole furnishing, a toilet that flipped out of the corner. “Not for long, anyway.”

  “One hopes,” Azarov murmured. “I heard that rats and insects crawl out of some of the commodes in the less well kept areas here.”

  “Commodes, Sergeant?” Borage asked. “You really do come from a civilized planet, don’t you?”

  Azarov shrugged, his cheeks coloring.

  “Check on Ankari and her friends too, Borage.” Viktor didn’t care about Azarov’s upbringing, not now. “They weren’t arrested, but—” Remembering the listening guard, he kept himself from saying that they should have been. “I want to make sure they haven’t been harmed.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Borage walked away, but Azarov lingered, the earnest sergeant lowering his voice and whispering, “I’ve taken a look at the schematics, sir, and the station jail employs the Merkowitz Prison Fire Safety System. It’s more humane than some of the systems found in the outer core. In the event of a fire where the temperatures reach approximately 60 degrees Celsius, the force barriers would be lowered, so prisoners would not be in danger of burning alive in their cells.”

  “You, too, big boy,” the guard called. “This isn’t social hour at the pub.”

  Azarov issued Viktor a quick salute before jogging out of sight, forgetting that the mercenaries didn’t bother with salutes. Viktor appreciated the gesture, nonetheless, and the information. He had no idea how he could use it at this time—an image of him blowing hot air onto a sensor popped into his mind—but one never knew when an opportunity might arise. For now, all he could do was wait and trust his people to do their research.

  Chapter 7

  “How long has it been since Jamie left?” Ankari asked, looking up from the holodisplay stretched across the air above the table. Everything from the station news feed to her research on Fleet ship movements to a letter she had just sent to her data-crunching friend Fumio sprawled in front of her.

  Lauren sat on the other side of the suite’s living room, engrossed in her own streams of information, ones that had more to do with her work than rescuing colleagues. Her brow furrowed as she squinted at some readout, and she did not answer.

  Ankari checked the time herself. “Two hours. Something must have gone wrong.”

  Jamie had come up with a scheme to help Sergei sneak off the ship without those androids noticing, but she had not divulged the details. Ankari had assumed it involved distracting the guards, either virtually or physically, and that those two could handle the problem themselves. Now, with time seeping past, she wondered if she should have gone along. She could do this research from anywhere. Whether Jamie returned soon or not, she and Lauren should find a new hotel room. She was hoping Fumio would have a way of booking one that wouldn’t use any of their names or bank accounts, just in case that Captain Xu turned out to be assiduous in searching for his tablet thief. She hoped he grew bored with the project or had other more important duties that required his attention—he was the captain of a one-thousand-man Fleet vessel, after all—but she couldn’t count on that.

  “Or they found a closet,” Lauren murmured, not looking up from her holodisplay.


  “What?”

  “If the shuttle is still guarded, they couldn’t have used that, so perhaps a closet along the way sufficed.”

  “I’m sure Jamie isn’t having sex with Sergei when the captain is in the brig and Fleet officers are stalking us.” Technically, the Fleet officer was only stalking Ankari, but no need to mention that.

  Lauren finally looked toward her, though only to raise her eyebrows in an extremely dry look. “Really? You and Mandrake could not contain yourselves last night. Even if we were busy with work and projects, we noticed that you didn’t return to the shuttle.”

  “Er, yes, but nobody was in the brig then. And we simply didn’t want to bother you. It’s not as if our shuttle has private cabins. You should be thankful that you had the place to yourselves. You almost had Commander Borage and Sergeant Azarov for bunk mates.”

  “Judging by the length of their other encounters, I would not worry for another two hours.”

  “Borage and Azarov’s?” Ankari asked. “I didn’t know they were a couple.”

  Unsurprisingly, Lauren’s expression was not amused.

  “I also didn’t know you were timing Jamie and Sergei when they went off to find... closets.” Ankari grimaced at the idea of Lauren keeping track of her and Viktor’s dalliances. She knew scientists liked to collect data but would not have guessed human sexual relations were of interest to Lauren.

  “Only in the cases where I’ve sought Jamie’s assistance in some engineering or mechanical matter only to find her detained.” Lauren’s lips tightened with disapproval.

  A soft knock came from the corridor. Ankari jumped to her feet. Jamie was on the approved guest list, so the door should have opened for her. Had she sent Sergei ahead? Or maybe she hadn’t been able to extricate him at all, she was in jail herself, and a security officer had come to collect Ankari.

  But the door slid aside, revealing Jamie and a familiar man dressed in grays and blacks. Jamie’s long hair, usually worn in tight braids, had been pulled back into a single ponytail, with stray wisps escaping to frame her face. Her cheeks had a ruddy glow that had not been there earlier, and Ankari glanced at Lauren, amused that her social-interaction-loathing microbiologist had guessed correctly.