Virtue of War

by L O Addison

  And how had they repaid him? By losing the weapon and threatening his life.

  The girl reached the door and made a sharp motion with her hand. The vater lizard leaped off him, and Lio sucked in a desperate gasp of air. But the girl’s pistol stayed trained right on his heaving chest. His heart kicked with a fresh wave of panic as she squinted at the gun’s sight, clearly taking aim.

  “You don’t have to do this,” he blurted out.

  She shrugged her shoulders. “Nope. But it sure makes things a hell of a lot easier.”

  She pulled the trigger. Sound exploded from the gun, and pain exploded in his chest. Then blackness overtook everything.

  6

  Beck

  Beck had just stepped inside the South Quarters when a gunshot cracked through the air. Shock froze him for a fraction of a second. Then his years of training kicked in, and he tore his pistol from its holster, charging toward the sound.

  He tapped at the earpiece clipped to his ear, activating the comm channel. “I need backup!” he snapped as he raced down the hallway. “South Quarters, first floor, eastern wing. Shots fired, enemy unknown.”

  Voices filled his ear as the nearby guards scrambled to respond to his message. Beck put on a fresh burst of speed. The building was a mass of winding hallways, making it hard to tell where the gunfire had come from, but he could guess easily enough. It must have come from the ambassador’s quarters.

  Three more gunshots rang out, but these were strangely high-pitched and quiet. A hideous snarl echoed down the hallways, sending a chill through Beck. That definitely wasn’t human. A second later, two more of the quiet shots rang out.

  Beck rounded a corner, barreling into the hallway that led to the ambassador’s quarters. The first thing Beck spotted was the girl—she lay sprawled on the ground only feet from him. Then he saw Marin. The bodyguard was backed against the wall, her sleek, white pistol gripped in her hands. A creature crouched in front of her, snarling and hissing as it used its teeth to tear two silver darts out of its shoulder.

  It was a dragon. A freaking dragon. The beast was the size of a large dog, with dark scales and razor sharp claws that were at least two inches long.

  The beast whirled away from Marin on unsteady legs, dropping a dart from its mouth. It locked eyes with Beck and let out a loud hiss as it leaped at him.

  Beck fired his pistol, but the dragon dodged to the side. His pistol’s explosive cartridge seared a hole the size of a baseball in the tile floor, but the dragon was untouched. Beck cursed and fired again. And again. But each time, the creature nimbly dodged his shots.

  Before Beck could get off another shot, Marin’s gun fired three times.

  The dragon stumbled to a halt. It turned its long neck around and stared at its back, where three more silver darts had pierced its hide. The creature let out a short squawk that reminded Beck of an annoyed curse. Then it went limp, flopping on its side in an unconscious heap of scales and talons. Its black color began to fade, leeching slowly away from its hide and leaving the creature a slate grey color.

  Beck raised his pistol at the beast, getting ready to fire the killing shot.

  “Don’t!” Marin snapped, stepping forward with her hand raised. “Those darts will keep it unconscious for at least an hour. There’s no need to kill it.”

  Beck gaped at her. “It just tried to kill us both!”

  Marin’s brow pulled down in a glare so intense, it made him flinch. “It’s a vater lizard. No more intelligent than a dog. If it wanted to kill us, the owner is to blame, not the animal.”

  Marin hurriedly gestured with her pistol at the girl sprawled on the ground. “Watch her,” she snapped. Then Marin took off, running into the open door of the nearest storage room.

  Four guards rounded the corner, their pistols drawn. Beck pointed to the young man at the front of the group.

  "You, guard the thief and call for medical aid," he ordered. "Everyone else, fan out and search the area. I want every room checked for any sign of an intruder."

  Beck didn't wait a moment longer before running after Marin. He burst into the storage room and found the ambassador sprawled on the floor by the entrance. Marin knelt at his side, her fingers pressed against the ambassador's wrist.

  Beck held his breath for an agonizingly long second. Then relief washed over Marin’s face.

  “He has a pulse," she said. She pressed Lio’s hand close to her chest, hugging it close to her as she added, “It’s steady.”

  Beck let out a long breath. Then he shook his head and said, “What the hell happened?”

  “I was about to ask you the same,” Marin snapped. The relief fled from her tone, leaving cold, hard anger. “Lio sent an emergency signal, and I found him just as the girl opened fire. I shot her, but then her beast attacked.”

  Beck glanced out the door, toward the girl sprawled in the hallway. “Is she dead?”

  Marin recoiled. “Of course not. I shot her with a tranquilizer. She should be awake within an hour, same as her beast.”

  Beck nodded and knelt next to the ambassador’s head. Lio’s eyes were closed, but his breathing was deep and even, and his left hand clutched at his chest. Beck lifted his hand away to reveal a slim, green dart sticking out of his shirt.

  “Taros dart,” Beck said, plucking the projectile from the ambassador. He held up the purple-tipped dart for Marin to see. “Probably not much different from the dart you used. Feels like acid when it hits you, but it doesn’t cause any damage. It’s just a harmless sedative.”

  Marin’s eyes narrowed. “You're sure?”

  “Positive,” Beck said with a nod. “The ambassador should wake up any minute.”

  Beck tried to keep his tone professional, but relief made his words shaky. If he had allowed the ambassador to be killed on his watch…

  He shuddered at the thought. Earth’s alliance with the Rhuramenti may have been critical, but it was also incredibly shaky. The death of an ambassador would have shattered it for good, and Beck would have been solely to blame.

  Lio let out a quiet groan and shifted slightly. Marin whispered something in their own language, as if in prayer, and pressed a comforting hand to the ambassador’s cheek. Her tenderness only lasted a moment, and then she pinned Beck with a harsh glare.

  “I want him taken to your medical ward immediately. Have your best doctor look over him, and run a full blood panel. I need to know for certain that nothing else was in that dart but the sedative.”

  “Of course,” Beck said, nodding. “We’ll give him the best of care.”

  Marin scoffed and muttered something else under her breath, although this time it sounded a hell of a lot more like a curse than a prayer.

  Beck carefully backed away, leaving Marin to tend to the ambassador. He had the feeling that staying by Lio’s side would only cause more trouble. As he was backing toward the door, he spotted the safe cracked open on the opposite side of the room. So it wasn’t just a typical storage room. Apparently, it stored something far more valuable than mundane base supplies.

  Beck strode back into the hallway, toward the girl who lay sprawled in the middle of the floor. “What the hell were you after?” he muttered.

  The young guard stood beside the unconscious intruder, his pistol held at the ready. Beck waved for him to back up and knelt beside the girl, getting a better look at her. She was dressed in all black and wore a black backpack that was stuffed full. He tugged at the zipper, revealing a glimmer of silvery purple inside.

  A strepind crystal. It was just one of the many pieces of alien technology the Resistance kept stored on their base. The goal was to keep the technology off the streets and out of the hands of people who wanted to use it for less-than-legal purposes.

  Apparently, the intruder hadn’t exactly been enthused about that goal.

  Beck glanced back toward the storage room with the safe, and the pieces clicked together in his mind. The intruder hadn’t come here to harm Lio. She probably hadn't even wanted
to run into him. She was just a thief, and Lio an unfortunate bystander who’d stumbled across her crime.

  Beck shook his head, unable to believe how horrific his luck was. Nathan was going to skin him alive. If Beck had just obeyed his orders and taken Lio to the North Quarters, instead of dragging him to this building, the ambassador never would have run into the thief.

  Beck muttered a frustrated curse and took a pair of handcuffs from his belt. He quickly snapped the metal cuffs on the thief’s wrists and activated their magnetic field. They clinked together, pinning the girl’s hands together.

  As he stared down at her bound hands, a tattoo caught his eye. The silhouette of a hawk was inked onto her right wrist, its wings spread out so they circled her arm like a bracelet.

  Beck froze in shock. He knew that tattoo. It’d been years since he’d seen it, but it was unique enough to easily stick in his mind.

  He brushed the girl’s thick brown hair from her face, desperate to get a better look at her. The thief had a heart-shaped face and delicate features that made her look young, but Beck knew she was in her early twenties, only a few years younger than him. Her eyes were closed, but if she opened them, Beck was sure they'd be a familiar hazel color.

  “Kaylin,” he whispered, shaking his head in disbelief. “What the hell did you get yourself into?”

  7

  Kaylin

  Kaylin woke up and immediately wished she hadn't. Pain cracked her skull and seared her brain. She groaned, squeezing her eyes shut and praying for sleep.

  It didn't work. Not that she’d really expected it to. Prayers had never done her much good.

  She tried to reach up to touch her aching head. Something dug into the skin of her wrists, holding them behind her back. A jolt of panic struck her, only worsening the pain in her skull. She gasped in a few breaths, struggling to clear her mind, and forced herself to open her eyes.

  Dim light and gleaming metal surrounded her. She peered around, biting back a groan as her stiff neck struggled to bend.

  A cell. That was where she was. Eight feet square of bare metal and concrete. She'd been tossed in the corner, her hands cuffed behind her back. There was nothing in the cell except for the hard floor, solid metal door, and a cot shoved into the corner. Which they hadn’t bothered to lay her on. Of course.

  “Red?” she mumbled.

  No response came.

  “Red? You there?”

  She spoke a little louder, and fresh pain ricocheted around her skull. But it was nothing compared to the pain of not hearing a response.

  Kaylin gave herself five seconds to feel panic. Five seconds of searing adrenaline and choking anxiety and rattling nerves. Then she breathed it all out and gulped in a giant breath, letting the air clear her mind.

  She was in prison. Now she needed to figure out how she could escape and where she could find Red.

  Last she remembered, she’d been racing out of the storage room. Her ears had still been ringing from the sound of her gun, and her heart pounded as she broke into a sprint.

  She'd shot an alien ambassador. Not with a lethal round, of course. Just a sedation dart. But she’d still fired a weapon at an inter-galactically protected politician.

  The penalty for that was death.

  The penalty for breaking into the Resistance’s base was death.

  The penalty for stealing the crystals was death.

  She was absolutely screwed. But she’d been screwed before and gotten away with it. Maybe not three-times-over screwed, but still. There had to be a way out of this.

  She took another deep breath and closed her eyes, desperately trying to find a solution. And nope. Nope. There was no solution, at least none that she could think of with her head hurting this badly.

  She needed a painkiller and a shot of liquor to wash it down. Then maybe she’d be able to calm down enough to come up with a plan of escape.

  A dull clang pierced the silence, and she bit back another groan. Deep, muffled voices came from outside the door, and she pried her eyes open. Her heart jolted as the door slid open.

  Kaylin blinked hard, struggling to get her eyes to focus on the figure in front of her. No. Figures, plural. There were two of them, one tall and dark, one short and pale. The shorter one stepped forward, his boot thunking against the concrete and bringing another groan from her.

  “Glad to see you’re awake,” he said, his deep voice booming through the room. “You’ve got some questions to answer.”

  Kaylin gasped in a deep breath and gulped back the nausea twisting her stomach. She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to ward off the barrage of sensations.

  “Maybe we should come back later,” the tall figure said. “I don’t think she’s awake enough to talk.”

  She knew that voice. That single, clear fact rose to the top of her muddled thoughts.

  “Beck,” she whispered.

  She remembered now. She’d seen him before, when he’d been leading the two aliens into the building.

  Kaylin opened her eyes to get a better look at him. He still looked exactly the same as he had when they’d worked together years ago—well over six feet tall, broad shoulders, dark skin. He had lithe muscle and short-cropped hair, although his deep brown eyes seemed like they would fit a puppy-dog better than a soldier.

  “Fancy running into you here,” she mumbled.

  Beck didn’t reply for a long moment. Then he quietly said, “Long time no see, Kay.”

  The shorter man grunted. “Well, there you have it. She’s awake enough to talk.”

  His footsteps clunked closer, and Kaylin recoiled back. Her shoulder and bound hands slammed against the wall behind her, making her wince. But she ignored the pain and stared up at the man.

  Commander Nathan Hayes. She’d only seen him in pictures before, but there was no mistaking him. He was middle-aged, with eyes the color of storm clouds and a thick scar that coursed across his right cheek. Rumor was he’d gotten that scar while fighting the Syndicate soldier who’d killed his wife. The commander was shorter than she’d expected, but he stood with the confidence of a man who was used to being in charge, his legs planted firmly on the ground and his thick arms crossed.

  He looked her up and down, his eyes narrowing.

  “You’re awfully tiny for causing such a ruckus,” Nathan said.

  Kaylin nodded toward him. “I could say the same about you.”

  He barked a sharp laugh. She waited for him to snap a comeback or a reprimand, but he just smirked and shook his head slightly.

  Shit. She’d been hoping she could get him pissed, because pissed off people made mistakes. And mistakes might give her an opening to escape. But he knew exactly what she was trying, and he wasn’t going to give her bait even a nibble.

  Nathan crouched in front of her, but her gaze slid over to Beck. He stood by the door, staring down at her with his large, dark eyes. There was none of the anger or hate in his expression that she’d expected. He merely looked sad and disappointed, and somehow that was ten times worse.

  Kaylin steeled her gaze, making sure none of her panic showed. Then she asked Beck, “Where’s Red? Is he okay?”

  Nathan raised an eyebrow. “Who’s Red?”

  “My vater lizard.”

  Beck tilted his head. “The dragon?”

  “Vater lizard,” Kaylin corrected. “Not a dragon.”

  “Your lizard has been contained,” Nathan said. “Whether or not he’s going to be okay depends entirely on whether or not you’re going to be cooperative.”

  A wave of anger struck her, and she glared up at the commander. “You can’t hurt him. He’s completely innocent.”

  Nathan scoffed. “Your precious little pet tried to rip out the throat of the ambassador’s bodyguard and my favorite lieutenant.” He nodded to Beck, although he kept his gaze locked on Kaylin. “That lizard is the farthest thing from innocent there is.”

  “He was just trying to protect me,” Kaylin said.

  “Ah,” Nathan sa
id, and that infuriating smirk reappeared on his face. “So then should we blame you for the bodyguard almost getting killed?”

  Kaylin pressed back into the wall, wishing she could disappear into it. There was no good answer to a question like that.

  Nathan pointed a finger at her. “Before you start confessing, let’s take a moment and run through all the crimes you’ve committed.”

  Kaylin bit her lip. “Can we maybe not?”

  Nathan ignored her and began ticking them off on his fingers. “Deserting the Resistance. Hacking our security system. Monitoring our communications. Disabling our security scanners and alarms. Breaching our base’s perimeter. Breaking into a high-security building. Busting open a highly secure safe.”

  She scoffed. “’Highly secure’ my ass. I got it open in ten minutes.”

  “Kay,” Beck snapped, shooting her a stern glance. It was the same one he’d given her hundreds of times when he’d trained her, a look filled with exasperated disapproval. But this time, there was an edge of desperation creasing the corners of his eyes.

  He’d always complained that she was too mouthy, and she knew he was right. But she didn’t give a damn. She was done with trying to appease the Resistance. She’d done that for years, holding her tongue and following their orders. And how had they repaid her?

  By making her kill innocent people. By turning her into a murderer.

  She was done respecting the Resistance. She’d decided that over a year ago when she’d deserted, and she wasn’t about to change her mind just because they had her imprisoned.

  She didn’t realize she was glaring back at Beck until he winced and looked away. He rubbed a hand over his face, as if trying to scrub away the feel of her gaze.

  Nathan glanced between the two of them with a calculating expression. Then he nodded to Kaylin.

  “Beck tells me he’s worked with you.”