by Iaz Grant
Zebb caught a slight movement out of the corner of his eye. Karliah had sidled up to him, as silent as always on feet that were as light as moth’s wings. Her catlike eyes narrowed into slits in her flat, furred face as she watched the screen.
“Tell me what happened.”
The young man’s mouth twitched, and with a flash of alarm Zebb saw that the other man was close to crying. “Whoever they were, they infiltrated the guards. They killed them, and replaced them with their own men.”
Icy dread clutched Zebb’s heart. “Then what?”
“They…oh, Jesus. They shut down the market plaza in the northwest district.”
Zebb’s heart dropped down to his feet. He felt cold all over. Roland gasped, Joyce swore, and Karliah let out a gentle hiss from between her needle-like, bared fangs.
Helena lived in the northwest district.
The young man continued. “They killed them. Everyone that was in the plaza at the time. Damn near fifty people. The whole station is in an uproar. The councilors are going to have a riot on their hands if they can’t calm the citizens down. Nobody can believe it. We haven’t been attacked in over a hundred years.”
“They killed everyone?” Zebb asked. His heart thumped sickly in his chest.
The man glanced down at a clipboard he held in his shaking hand. “No, not all. Four people are unaccounted for. The general consensus is that the invaders abducted them.”
“Who was taken?”
The man flipped a page on the clipboard. “Ava Greene, Penelope Rogers, Riley Thomas, and Helena Murdock.”
Zebb gripped the edge of the control panel. He felt the cold metal edge pierce his flesh, but his mind didn’t register the pain. His stomach churned.
“Captain—“ Roland began, but Karliah silenced him with a low snarl. Zebb was grateful. He couldn’t handle any questions or condolences from his squad at the moment.
Gone. She was gone.
“Let me speak to the General,” Zebb said. His lips were numb.
The young man’s eyes flickered with uncertainty. “I haven’t seen him since this all started. He’s shut up in his office with the members of the council. One of the women who was taken was the daughter of—“
“I know who she is,” Zebb said curtly. He swallowed back his rising terror, refusing to let the tiniest sign of weakness shine through to the other man. “I need to speak to him.”
“I’m afraid I don’t have the authority to demand an audience,” the young man said meekly.
Zebb rubbed his forehead. Pain throbbed at his temples. “I do. Tell him that Captain Welsh will be arriving to talk to him shortly.” Without waiting for the young man’s reply, Zebb slammed the button, cutting off communication as the holographic screen disappeared.
He felt the eyes of his three crewmates boring into him. Without looking up, he shot at Joyce, “Full speed ahead, and don’t you dare stop for anything.”
“Yes, sir,” Joyce said quietly. For once, the sharpness had left her voice.
Zebb closed his eyes, letting his panic and his misery wash over him. Helena’s beautiful face haunted his mind.
Chapter Four
“Let me go!” Helena commanded. Her sleek black hair was in disarray, and bruises were beginning to form on her pale arms, testament to her captor’s rough treatment of her.
The two men only laughed before pushing her forward. Behind her, Helena could hear Ava, a young blond woman of nineteen that she knew vaguely from the station, sobbing loudly.
Helena was frightened and confused. After taking her from the plaza, the guards had bustled the four women into a ship, which had immediately taken off. Helena, as well-connected and, thanks to Zebb, as familiar with the military as she was, hadn’t recognized the insignia on the ship, nor its make or model. Whoever these men were, they weren’t part of the Alliance.
She was being led down a narrow hallway. There were no windows, but the vibrations underneath Helena’s feet told her that the ship was going very fast indeed; faster than she’d thought possible. The entire vessel was state-of-the-art. Whoever these men were, they had money; that much was clear.
The guard in front of her threw open a heavy metal door. Lights flickered unsteadily inside. A narrow set of metal steps led down, and Helena was able to crane her neck and catch a glimpse of stacked boxes and crates. She’d been in enough ships to know where she was headed.
“Uh-huh,” she said fiercely. “No way. You’re not putting me in the cargo hold.” From her experience, cargo holds were cold, cramped, and incredibly unsafe; boxes frequently came loose and banged against each other, and since most of the cargo was usually packed in steel boxes, broken bones were a very real possibility.
The guard, the same one who had spoken to her in the station, grinned. It was a terrifying grin, seeming both cold and gleeful at the same time. “You’ll do as you’re commanded, Lady Murdock,” he said. His voice dripped with mockery, and she glared at him.
He took a step forward and stroked her hair. She shuddered with revulsion.
“Don’t worry,” he said quietly. “You get a special spot on the far end by the wall. You’ll be quite safe. After all,” he leaned in even closer, so that only she could hear his words, “we wouldn’t want anything to happen to our prize. Xander will be pleased, very pleased, when he sees you.”
She swallowed. She was even more confused by what the man had said. Prize? Just what were they going to do with her?
Then, before she could stop him, the man slipped his hand underneath the short hem of her dress and squeezed her thigh; with the other, he cupped her breast. She gasped and tried to squirm away, but the two stony-faced guards behind her only tightened their grip on her arms.
The man grinned again, and her blood ran cold. He stroked her nipple with his thumb, and she shivered again, disgust and horror mingling with the first bite of real lust she’d felt in her life. It repulsed her even as it excited her.
He finally took his hands off of her, and she sighed with relief. “Put them in,” he said as he turned away from her.
Rough hands shoved her through the doorway, and she stumbled down the stairs. The three other young women were pushed in behind her, and the door was slammed shut with a hollow bang behind them, leaving them in an icy semi-darkness as the florescent lights flickered.
“Helena,” Ava whispered. “What are they going to do with us?”
Helena crossed her arms. Her eyes flickered towards the other two girls, who she didn’t know. “I don’t know,” she confessed.
“So what station did they grab you from?” a dull, tired-sounding voice came floating from the corner of the room.
The four young women jumped, and for the first time, Helena noticed that they weren’t alone. Six other women sat, slumped and forlorn, along the edge of the wall. Five of the women were human. But the sixth one, the one who had spoken, was a Brakomi. Helena blinked in surprise. Sheltered as she was on the human-dominated station, she’d only seen a handful of aliens up close, and only one—Karliah—for extended periods of time.
Brakomi were another race, out of five, that were part of the Alliance and therefore on friendly terms with humans. They, like several other alien species, were humanoid in appearance; in fact, if a Brakomi wore a hood and was standing in dim light, they could pass as one. Until, that is, one got close enough to notice their red skin, black pupil-less eyes, and sharp teeth.
This Brakomi, as alarming as her appearance was, was actually quite pretty. She smiled, revealing fangs that Helena knew that even Karliah, as proud as she was of her teeth, would envy.
“We’re from 536,” Helena replied.
“536?”
“Yes.”
The Brakomi sat up straighter. She ignored the rest of the human women; her unsettling eyes locked with Helena’s. “Purple eyes,” she murmured.
“It’s a genetic mutation,” Helena said automatically. She was used to curiosity by now.
But the Brakomi ignored her
. “You’re not Helena Murdock, by any chance?”
Helena blinked in surprise. “Yes, I am. Why?”
The Brakomi shook her head regretfully. “That’s a shame. I didn’t know you, but I was hoping you got away.”
“What are you talking about?” Helena glanced around the room. “Where are we, anyway? Who were those men, and where are we going?”
The other women in the room were watching the conversation with wide, frightened eyes as the Brakomi sighed and placed her hands on her lap. She shifted her position, settling against the corner to get more comfortable. “I’m Sondara. I was kidnapped two days ago. These humans forget I have better hearing than they do, and I heard them talking this morning. They hit 536 in the hopes of capturing you. Xander has put out a personal request for you. And from what I hear, Xander is a man who gets what he wants.”
Helena’s heart thumped rapidly in her chest. “Why does he want me? Who are these men?”
Sondara smiled grimly. “They’re slavers, Helena, and we’re their cattle. I suppose it’ll be the end of the line for us sooner or later.”
Ava gasped, and one of the other women from 536 began to sob again. Helena swallowed. “Slaves? What sort of slaves?”
Sondara’s black eyes carried a trace of sadness as they settled upon Helena. “You don’t want to know.”
Chapter Five
Zebb shook with barely controlled fury. “Slavers?”
“From what we’ve ascertained, that’s our best guess,” General Yule said. His voice carried a hint of impatience. “We’ve received reports of similar abductions on stations in the East Quadrant as well as the Milky Way. There’s been rumors of a black-market female slave trade circulating around for years, but we have no proof.”
Zebb stood up a little straighter. “Let me go after them, General,” he urged. “I will gather my squad and hunt them down immediately.”
“Your fifteen-man squad?” the general said incredulously. He lifted a bushy eyebrow, and Zebb was struck with the urge to punch the man in the face. He would gladly take the year in the stockade and deduction of rank such an act would cost him, anything to wipe the look of the fat old man’s face. “No offense meant, Captain, but that would accomplish nothing.”
“So what are you going to do about it?” Zebb asked through gritted teeth.
“At the moment, nothing.” Yule raised his hand, cutting off Zebb’s angry protest. “I understand that you’re emotionally involved, Welsh, and that’s exactly why we can’t have you running off after these people. Right now, my primary concern is with the security issues here on the station. These people are angry, scared, and grieving. Fifty-two people are dead. We need to mourn—“
“We need to rescue the hostages before that number rises by four!”
The general’s eyes flashed. “We need to handle this situation first, and then I will be detaching several ships to find them. I think you’ll find that they’ll be much more suitable to the task than your little delegation.”
White-hot anger coursed through Zebb, but he was able to reign it in. But just barely.
“I’m sorry, Welsh, but that’s my final word. Please remove yourself from my office.” The general gestured towards the door. Seething, Zebb stood up and strode away on stiff, trembling legs.
As he’d hoped, they were waiting for him outside the door; Karliah, Tyler, and Roland. They took one look at his stony face and deduced the truth.
“He’s not sending anyone?” Tyler asked.
Zebb swallowed back his anger. “No. Not yet.” He turned and walked away. His white cape whipped behind him. “Have the rest of the squad meet me on the loading docks in ten minutes.”
He didn’t look back behind him to see if they obeyed or not.
***
Zebb clasped his hands behind his back and scanned the faces of his comrades; brave men and women all, who’d stood by his side through thick and thin and brought justice and peace to many reaches of the infinite universe.
He was not reassured by their thunderstruck expressions.
He’d just finished explaining everything to them; the attack and the murders, the four missing women, the general’s statement, and his plan. All along he’d known that there would be at least a few members of his crew that would be hesitant to go along with such a risky mission, but he hadn’t expected the apprehension and the uncertainty of nearly all of them.
“Let me get this straight,” Hudson, one of his soldiers, said. He crossed his muscular arms. “You want us to defy the High General and pursue these men? Just us?”
“Yes,” Zebb said shortly.
“And what happens when the General finds out that we disobeyed?”
Zebb, who hadn’t thought that far ahead, said nothing.
“We don’t have the manpower or the arms to carry out a successful rescue,” Hudson pointed out.
“If you want out, Hudson, just say so,” Zebb shot at him.
Hudson hesitated. “I’m sorry, sir. You know I respect you, but everyone on this ship knows that you’re friends with the Murdock girl. Your judgement is clouded, and it’s not down in my contract that I have to be dragged along on a suicide mission.”
“That’ll do,” Zebb said, biting his tongue to keep from lashing out at the other man in his anger. Hudson was right, after all. It might very well be a suicide mission, and it wouldn’t be fair of him to force his crew along if they didn’t want to go.
“I won’t hold it against any of you if you say no,” he added, addressing the small crowd of people. “But I’m leaving in ten minutes. If you’re coming with me, I need you on board by then.”
The crew began to whisper amongst themselves, but Zebb ignored them. His eyes sought out Karliah. She stood on the fringes of the group. Her face was expressionless, although her long tail twitched restlessly. He approached her and took her hands in his. Her fingers ended in claws rather than fingernails, and they dug into his flesh as he squeezed her hands.
“Karliah,” he said in a low voice as he gazed into her strange yellow eyes. “All these years, I’ve been honored to have you fighting by my side. You know how important this is to me. She needs me, and I have to find her. Old friend, will you help me?”
Her gaze softened. “You don’t even have to ask. Even if it’s only the two of us, I will stand beside you the whole way.”
His shoulders sagged with relief. “Thank you. I knew I could count on you.” He released her sleek, furred hands and turned towards the rest of the crew. “Who else is going?”
An unhappy murmur ran through the group of people. Finally, after only a moment’s hesitation, Joyce swept her fiery red hair to the side and said loudly, “I am.”
“Thank you,” he said, pleased. No one on Juliet Seven was a better pilot that Joyce, although he himself knew how to fly the vessel and had been prepared to do so if Joyce hadn’t been willing to accompany them.
“Who else?”
Tyler swallowed and stepped forward. Zebb felt a surge of affection for the boy swell within him. Tyler was scared green, he could tell, but still, he was volunteering.
“I’ll go,” Tyler said with an air of feeble bravery.
Zebb clapped the young man on the shoulder. “I knew that you’d step up, Tyler.”
He locked eyes with each and every member of his squad. “No one else?”
They shuffled their feet and stared at the ground.
