by Rhonda Mason
* * *
The summons to an early morning meeting with Raorin wasn’t unexpected. The TNV situation on Wei-lu-Wei approached utter chaos, and they planned to use that, use every piece of political leverage they had to secure Sovereign Council votes for withdrawing from Ordoch. It was their only hope for securing the Wyrds’ help with the TNV.
Kayla arrived at the same time as Councilor Gi, Wei-lu-Wei’s primary voting influencer. Whichever way Gi voted, so would the rest of the Wei-lu-Wei councilors. Thankfully General Yislan hadn’t been available. For the best. He might support their cause, but his pontificating turned people off. Herself especially.
Kayla stopped short inside the office when she spotted Commander Parrel. He arched a cold brow with a look of “Well? Are you just going to stand there?”
One day soon, they were going to have a reckoning over Malkor and his divided loyalties. She felt it stirring between her and Parrel.
So be it.
Malkor might revere Parrel and Isonde might hope that Parrel could convince the IDC leadership to make a formal statement supporting a withdrawal from Wyrd Space, but if Parrel wanted to have private words with Kayla and a battle for Malkor’s ultimate loyalty, he could bring it on.
Kayla swept past him and took a seat as the Low Divine entered, her young face a study in aloof elegance. Kayla had argued against involving the girl. Isonde and Raorin overruled her, saying the Low Divine would sway popular opinion because she held the people’s hearts.
Raorin thanked the Low Divine for coming and she inclined her head in acknowledgement of the great favor she had done him. In truth, the girl probably couldn’t stay away, despite her dislike for Raorin and his irreverent attitude. She had enough political savvy to know when something big was afoot, and a gathering of disparate elements such as these reeked of intergalactic change.
“Thank you all for making it here so early,” Raorin said, immediately commanding attention. “I’m sure you agree that the situation on Wei-lu-Wei has gone from dire to near catastrophic. The army’s quarantine of the planet is still incomplete, allowing ships to escape and jump stream to points unknown, possibly spreading the TNV.
“Worse still, no effective isolation protocols have been established on the planet’s surface. Citizens are streaming from the cities in considerable numbers in an effort to escape anyone carrying the nanovirus. Who knows how many of them are infected themselves? They’re fleeing into the farmland and the wilds, spreading the virus across the planet even quicker than it could have moved on its own. If something isn’t done, we’re looking at devastation on a global scale of one of the richest planets in the empire.”
Councilor Gi’s dark skin took on a grayish hue, her lips pinched and white around the edges.
“More than ever,” Raorin said, “we need a cure. A way to stop the TNV.”
Siminia interjected. “We need to stop people running into the unaffected areas like a mindless, stampeding horde.”
“What would you have them do?” Gi snapped. “Stay in the cities and die? Have you never seen the vids of TNV victims?”
“They have to think globally—”
“How?” Gi’s furious, shaky voice choked off Siminia’s words. “How the stars could they ‘think globally’ while their children’s bodies are broken down protein by protein? Their friends and neighbors destroyed from the inside out by a nanovirus with a 99.9% kill rate?”
Raorin let the moment sit, the words heavy in the air.
The devastation of it, the inexorability.
For the first time, the immensity of the TNV infection hit Kayla. The nanovirus could eat the empire alive, until there was nothing left but rocks and water and the abandoned bones of a once giant civilization.
“We need a cure,” Gi said, “no matter what we have to do to get it.” Even the Low Divine nodded her head at the statement. Everyone looked to Raorin for guidance.
“Now is the time to push,” he said, “to demand a full withdrawal from Ordoch. Only the Wyrds are advanced enough to design a counter-nanovirus—fruitless years in our own laboratories have proven that.”
Surely they realize that. Kayla’s gaze traveled the room, willing those gathered to accept the truth of the situation. Only my people can help you, she nearly shouted. Make the damn withdrawal happen.
“There are other options,” the Low Divine said, her childlike voice out of place.
Raorin shook his head sharply. “We cannot wait another decade for our scientists to advance in their understanding of nanotechnology.”
“I meant, other ways of influencing the Wyrds.”
Kayla’s hands curled into fists at the word “influence.”
Raorin stared the Low Divine down. “‘Other ways’ have not worked to date, and we are out of time.”
Without drastic measures, the empire might be too far gone already. Isolationist measures on a planetary scale were required, measures that would sever the interconnectedness of the imperial planets and bring down the intergalactic civilization.
“Low Divine, I implore you,” Kayla forced herself to say, and only because Isonde had ordered her to. “Use all of your influence with the people. Sway their hearts toward peace with the Wyrds. Exhort them to prevail upon their councilors to vote for a withdrawal.”
The young woman made no response.
“Commander Parrel, you have been much too silent,” Raorin said. “I know you favor withdrawal, as do many within the IDC. The IDC can no longer afford to be neutral.” Raorin leaned forward in his earnestness, dark braid falling over his shoulder. “The backing of the IDC would almost certainly guarantee a win for us. What say you?”
Parrel held silent so long it seemed he would not answer. He looked at each of them in turn, judging them, and Kayla held her breath. What was he debating saying—or not saying?
“The IDC hasn’t changed its official stance.” The word “yet” hung in the air after Parrel spoke.
When they did change their stance, who would make the decision—the IDC Malkor proudly represented, or Vega’s corrupt faction?
Parrel met Kayla’s eyes across the room. This was so much bigger than the rest of them understood.
And much, much worse.
* * *
Kayla smoothed down the pencil skirt she wore, its shin-length fabric creased from hours upon hours of sitting during the council session. She’d been on edge the entire time, keeping a tally as the number of their supporters shifted after each councilor’s speech.
Her heels clicked down the corridor as she made her way—finally—toward the maglift at the end. She could do without the presence of one of Geth’s councilors beside her, still speaking heavily accented Common. Anyone from Bredard’s home nation unsettled her.
Though, telling him to shove off was probably out of the question. Damn.
He’d kept her long after the session had ended, he and the councilors from Timpania, arguing against Piran’s intended boycott of Timpania’s gallenium ore if the workers’ conditions didn’t improve in their refineries. She’d wanted to say, “Honestly? I have so many other things on my plate right now I couldn’t care less.” The councilor from Geth might have some control over Bredard, though, and Timpania could be brought over to the side of Ordochian withdrawal if Piran agreed to delay their boycott. So, as tired as she was from the long string of days, Kayla had lingered and listened.
At least the councilor from Timpania finally let her leave. The Gethan councilor followed her from the chamber, prattling the whole way down the corridor. For once she couldn’t wait to reach Ardin’s bodyguards; they’d pry the unctuous man loose. Sadly, they were stationed in a room off the front lobby with all the other bodyguards.
They waited side by side for the maglift, Kayla nodding noncommittally to his spiel. Isonde would want to know everything he said. Kayla just wanted to pinch the bridge of her nose over the headache that brewed and tune the tenacious man out. “I’m sure we can continue this tomorrow—” she was sayi
ng, when the lift doors opened and a familiar face grinned at her.
Siño, Bredard’s pet biocybe.
Before she could react, Geth’s councilor launched her into the lift with a shove between her shoulder blades. Siño stepped back, letting her in, his fist clubbing her cheek as she passed. She staggered, catching herself against the wall with one hand as the lift doors sealed her inside with Siño. No doubt the Gethan was fleeing the scene.
The lift didn’t move.
Siño grabbed her hair and tried to slam her head against the wall. She locked her elbow, her arm like an iron bar thwarting the attempt. He yanked on her hair instead, jerking her head back, and she elbowed him with her free arm, catching him straight on the nose. Blood spurted and she got a second strike off before he could block it. His hand dropped from her hair and she turned in time to receive a blow to her solar plexus that knocked the breath from her.
Frutting strength augmentations.
She tried to strike with a knee but the frutting skirt Isonde had dressed her in trapped her legs. Instead, still wheezing, she jabbed two fingers into his left eye.
Direct hit.
His answering roar shook the lift.
Siño caught her wrist when she struck again, stopping her fingertips no more than a centimeter from his right eye.
Damn he’s quick. And half-blind now, at least.
Her wrist bones ground together in his vise grip, drawing a grunt of pain from her and shooting agony up her arm. She swung with her free hand. He saw it coming and ducked. Blood streamed from his crushed nose. He gave her a gory, crimson grin that promised fun for him and death for her. A very painful death.
As she started her backswing, he straightened from his crouch like a coiled spring let loose. Her blow collided with his ear as he caught her throat with an open hand strike that nearly crushed her trachea. He continued his momentum and lifted her off her feet with a stranglehold that pinned her to the lift wall.
Spots danced in her vision. She scrabbled ineffectually against his grip with her free hand. Nails clawing, fingers twisting for a handhold.
Choking, airless and desperate, training took over. She raised her arm, bringing it down in a hammer fist that struck the inside of his elbow in an attempt to bend the joint and break his stiff-arm hold. It had no effect, not against his biocybe augmentations. Second and third strikes were just as useless.
She gripped his arm at the wrist, trying to hold some of her own weight and take the pressure off her throat. Her vision began contracting, Siño’s face becoming her whole world. With the last of her strength she lifted her knees together and kicked out at his stomach.
The sharp points of her heels sank into his flesh but he only grunted. She tried to lift her knees for another strike. Couldn’t. She was done.
As the world slid away, he released her, dropping her to the ground in a mess of coughing and choking. She couldn’t draw air. She knelt, one hand to her aching throat, the other barely holding her up. Even between gasps, though, she planned her next strike. If she could just… catch… her breath.
Wham!
His foot came down on her back, crushing her flat on the floor. His added weight compressed her lungs and she lay there, sucking in air, waiting for whatever came next. With one cheek ground against the floor and her neck bent at an awkward angle, she could barely look up at him.
Siño studied her a second, his uninjured eye overbright. “Bredard has a message for you,” he said finally. That his voice sounded thick due to his smashed nose was her only consolation.
A message? The man had a frutting message? “Worst… messenger… ever,” she gasped out.
“He didn’t say how I was to deliver it.” He pressed down harder with his foot, clearly enjoying the moment.
“Frutter,” she huffed, and he laughed.
“You don’t know the half of it.” Siño wiped blood from his mouth. He had the heel of his other hand pressed against the eye she’d injured. The two puncture wounds in his chest oozed nothing more serious than lubricant.
Must be internal body armor of some sort.
There was a gleam in his good eye that she didn’t like when he looked at her again. “Man, what I couldn’t do with a woman like you. If you’re half this fierce in bed…”
She spat in his direction, the only offensive she had the strength for. Her left wrist might be broken and his foot kept her too neatly pinned to get her legs around for a strike at his standing knee.
“We could find out. This lift’s locked down, no one to disturb us.”
“Try it… you’re… dead,” she grated out between labored breaths.
That made him laugh. Laugh. The frutter.
“Feisty, especially for a woman who’s gone zero and two against me.”
“Arrogant… for a half… machine who has to… ambush me.” She coughed and spat again. “With help.”
His smile faded, his gaze cooling. He pulled his hand off of his gouged eye, blinked it a few times. “Business, then. You’re out of time. Bredard wants his data by midnight tonight.”
“He said—”
“Things have changed. Midnight tonight.”
“I don’t… have—” He leaned on her back with his foot, cutting her off.
“Then get it.” He watched her for understanding and she glared at him. “Good. Now, I’m leaving. And unless you want a kick to the midsection and some broken ribs, I suggest you stay down until I’m gone.” She nodded, though it galled her to do it.
He backed off two paces and took his eyes off her long enough to glance at an open panel in the ceiling she hadn’t had a spare second to notice. He jumped and grabbed the edges of it, then pulled himself up with a quickness only advanced biomechanics could achieve.
Then he was gone.
Kayla pushed to her feet, wincing at the pain in her wrist, her knees, her throat. A minute passed before she could stand upright and take a full breath. She shuffled to the lift’s controls.
Yup. There it was.
She yanked out the locking pin Siño had inserted, hit the ground level indicator, and leaned against the wall as the maglift descended.
Midnight. She only had until midnight.
Kayla jammed the locking pin back into place, halting the lift. If Ardin’s guards saw her like this, roughed up and worse for wear, they’d go into high alert. Or higher alert than they already were. They’d take her directly to the palace and practically imprison her for her own safety. Well, Isonde’s, she corrected.
She couldn’t afford to be on lockdown, not tonight.
She took stock of her appearance. Her hairdo was destroyed, so she pulled the few remaining clips from it and redid her hair in a simple bun. Not as elegant as Isonde, but it would get the job done. Her heels had survived the collision with Siño’s chest. She twisted her skirt back into place and checked the rest of her damage.
When she patted her throat the biostrip was still there, and a look at her unscarred hand proved that the image held. The injury to her wrist wouldn’t show until the bruising started. Her neck was likely red and swollen, though, and Siño’s blood on the elbow of her suit jacket would give her away in a second.
She stripped off the jacket and turned it inside out. She made short work of ripping the satin inner lining from the sleeve and tying it around her neck like a scarf. It was the right length, and she tucked the torn edges underneath it. She righted the jacket and folded it, bloodied side in, and draped it over her injured wrist. It would do for the short ride from the council chambers to her townhouse.
It would have to.
* * *
Kayla reclined on the sofa in Isonde’s room—where she’d been since she returned an hour ago—as they went over the Sovereign Council’s session. Isonde sat in a green silk wingback chair beside the sofa. She looked fatigued and a little fragile, not that she’d admit to it.
The doors slid open as Malkor entered. His voice cracked across the room even before the doors closed. “What the
frutt happened?” He zeroed in on Kayla.
She shifted her position on the couch, thankful to have a break from Isonde’s grilling. “Bredard’s biocybe sent me a message.”
“So you said on the comm. What kind of—” He stopped, his gaze seeming to take in the regen cuff around her wrist, the coolant gel pack adhered to her neck and the blue concoction in her hand that Toble insisted she drink for her throat.
“Eh,” Kayla shrugged one shoulder. “I think Siño had a bone to pick with me after my last visit with Bredard.” Make that a very large bone. Her voice came out raspy and she took another slug of the drink Toble had prepared. It slid down her throat with a welcome coolness.
“I’m fine. I’ve had way worse, and Toble’s already been to see me.” A close-quarters fight with a biocybe half-again her body weight trumped a night in the Blood Pit for pain factor, but it was nothing she couldn’t handle after some meds and a coolant pack to reduce the swelling.
Malkor nodded, clearly trusting her assessment, which only made her love him more. He finally looked at Isonde. “Should you be out of your pod?”
“Kayla gets beaten by an augmented human and you’re asking if I should be in the pod?”
Malkor threw up a hand. “Fine. You’re all fine. Tougher than ten agents. Can we get on with it then? What was Bredard’s message?”
“I’m here,” Ardin said, hurrying into the room and sitting on the sofa closest to Isonde’s chair. He took her hand. “Should you be out of bed?” he asked.
Isonde uttered a very un-princess-like expletive. “If one more person tries to stick me back in that pod I’m going to sic Kayla on them. Got it?”
She glared at Malkor, then Ardin, who smiled a little. “You are feeling better,” Ardin said.
Kayla cleared her raspy throat, then took another gulp of Toble’s blue concoction. “We’re out of time,” she said.
“How do you mean?” Malkor asked.
“Literally. Bredard moved his deadline to midnight tonight.”
“Shit.” Malkor checked his mobile comm. “I thought we had more days? That’s less than four hours.”
“Then we had best figure out what the frutt we’re going to do,” Kayla said, “or come tomorrow morning we’ll be sitting pretty on execution watch.
