by Rachel Aukes
“Hey, I’m talking to you.”
Eddy turned stiffly, as though rigor mortis had claimed his neck, and faced the Jader. “Me?”
“Yeah, you. Who are you?” The man was filthy, with his coveralls covered in layers of stains to the point that Eddy couldn’t tell what the original color had been. The man’s skin was similar in that grease and lack of bathing disguised what could’ve been very pale or very dark skin. He was dragging a rolling welding cart behind him. The worker carried no visible weapon, to Eddy’s relief, since Eddy had not thought to bring one himself.
“I’m Eddy,” he said as a matter of fact.
The worker didn’t seem impressed. “What are you doing here?”
“I came with them.”
“Them who?”
He wondered if Throttle and Finn had given their real names. He stammered, “You know. Them. The pair who just brought in that ship.” He motioned to where the Javelin was docked.
“Oh, them. Well, they’re with Jack right now. You shouldn’t be around here without an escort. That’s one of Jack’s rules.”
“Oh, I didn’t know,” Eddy said. “The dock seal has a small air leak. I was told to fix it. No one said anything about having an escort.”
“Typical. No one ever tells us peons what’s going on around here.” He took a step closer. The stink of beans and curry wafted through the air. Eddy scrunched his nose. The man farted and didn’t even seem to care, though Eddy began to wonder if perhaps the man had shat his pants. Eddy swallowed back his gag reflex.
The worker glanced over to the open area before turning back to Eddy. “Listen, buddy. I’m busy, so I can’t babysit you. But maybe I can point you in the right direction. What are you trying to do?”
Eddy motioned to the workstation. “I was trying to unlock the holding bars on docks four and five so I could have some wiggle room to work.”
The worker held up a hand. “Whoa. Don’t mess with the dock controls. If you’re not careful, you could open an airlock to a vacant dock. Then we’d all be vented.”
“Well, I certainly don’t want to do that.”
The worker frowned. “But I guess you probably couldn’t have hurt anything. Only Jack and Randall have access to the dock systems. They’re control freaks.”
“Oh, I’ve known plenty like them,” Eddy concurred. “But if I can’t unlock the docks, it’s going to take me three times as long to fix the seals.”
“Wish I could help, but you know how guys like that are. They’re so bent on keeping their power that they make life hell for those of us working for them.” The worker smiled then, revealing rotted teeth. “You know, once I wrap up my project, I’ll be on break. I don’t suppose you want to join me in the galley for some chow later?”
Eddy gulped and grabbed his tool bag in a rush. “Oh, I wish I could, but I can’t. I’m sure this project will take me all night.”
Disappointment flashed across the worker’s face.
“Maybe tomorrow,” Eddy added.
The worker brightened. “Yeah. I’ll see you then.” He started to walk away, still tugging the welding cart behind him when he paused. “I’ll send up Charlie to help you. That way, Jack won’t throw a fit, and you can maybe wrap up your job faster, maybe even in time for supper.”
“Oh. Uh, sure. Thanks.”
As the worker trudged away, Eddy reached into his bag and pulled out his heaviest tool, a thick crescent wrench. He set down his bag to grip the wrench with both hands. He strode up behind the worker, lifted the wrench, closed his eyes, and swung.
The worker collapsed. Blood poured from a deep wound on the back of his head.
“Sorry,” Eddy said, wincing. He didn’t check to see if the man was still alive or not. He didn’t want to know. He’d never killed anyone before. In fact, he’d only ever killed bugs that didn’t run from him, and four rodents that had torn into the food stores on the Gabriela during the colonization trip out to the Ross system. He hadn’t slept well all night each time he’d had to kill one. He couldn’t imagine how his sleep would be disturbed if he’d killed a person.
That the worker wasn’t moving was all Eddy needed. The Jader had been about to send someone else up, who likely wouldn’t have been as easy to fool.
Eddy turned back to the workstation, but his gaze snagged on a red compartment in the wall. He frowned and stepped over to it, still holding the bloody wrench in a hand. “Well, I’ll be…”
Above the compartment, it read In case of station-wide emergency, pull handle to unlock ships from docks. Board ships and close airlocks.
Eddy’s jaw slackened as humor filled him. “This is too easy.”
He went to open the compartment but found the door padlocked. He lifted his wrench, noticed the blood on the tip, and immediately glanced back at the fallen worker. Seeing no movement and feeling full of guilt, he turned back to the wall and slammed the wrench through the glass door. He reached in and pulled the single lever.
He expected sirens to blast, but the only sounds that greeted Eddy were audible clicks at each airlock door as the locks released the ships they held. The green lights above each door turned red, and data changed on the panel at each entrance.
Thanks to the law of inertia, the ships would remain in their current positions, lightly suctioned to the station by the airlocks. But the slightest movement could break the ships free.
Eddy ran to the Javelin, stopped, turned around, grabbed his tool bag, and sprinted to the airlock. He opened the station’s airlock door with trepidation, but the short transit tube between the ship and station remained sealed. He stepped through, opened the Javelin’s airlock door, and jumped on board, immediately closing the airlock door behind him.
He collapsed against the door, clutching his tool bag on his lap, relief pouring through him.
“Are you okay, Eddy?” Rusty asked.
“I think so. It was just really scary out there,” he said.
“I’ll have a tea brewed for you.”
“I’d like that.” He allowed himself a couple more calming breaths before he reached up and clicked his comm-chip a single time. He found his nerves returning, along with his impatience. “Come on, guys. Hurry up.”
“Eddy, the High Spirit is departing the dock under its own power,” Rusty said.
Eddy frowned. “Is Sylvian back aboard yet?”
“No. My cameras show that she never left the High Spirit.”
“Why is she still over there and not over here with us?” Eddy asked.
There was a pause before Rusty replied, “I wish I knew that answer. Whatever happened on that ship is now going to cause trouble for Throttle and Finn. We should help them because I don’t want to be dissected and sold off as parts.”
Eddy jumped to his feet. “I have an idea.”
Jack rambled on while he and his goon escorted Throttle and Finn through the work area. She could barely hear him over the din and hadn’t realized he’d asked her a question until he looked over his shoulder. “I said, you know something I find odd?”
She cocked her head. “Oh? What’s that?”
Jack stopped. “You came here to sell me the ship you came in on, but you don’t have a ship to leave with.”
She answered without a pause. “Skully Pete mentioned you’d give us a ride to Jade-8, where we’ll join up with another crew there.”
His brows lifted. “He did, did he?”
“Or you could loan me one of the four other ships you have docked outside,” she offered.
He smirked. “I don’t do loans. I may have a cargo hauler dropping off supplies tomorrow, and it heads back to Jade-8, though it stops at several other stations along the way.”
She shrugged. “Then we’ll hitch a ride on that. Pete seemed to think getting a ride wouldn’t be a problem.”
“And it won’t be, but it’ll cost you,” Jack said.
“Of course. That’s what I’d expect,” she said.
“I’ll deduct it from your find
er’s fee on the ship you brought here,” he said and resumed walking.
They hadn’t made it twenty feet before a scrawny man ran up to Jack. “Mr. Jack, the High Spirit just took off.”
Jack grabbed the man’s shoulders. “What do you mean, it took off?”
“It’s gone. It just flew off,” the newcomer said in a rush.
“Sound the alarms,” Jack said, and did a visual three-sixty around them. His gaze settled on Throttle and Finn.
He pulled out a gun, and Throttle and Finn did the same. It was a standoff. Jack and Throttle had each other dead to rights, and Jack’s goon and Finn had each other. The workers around them ran off, leaving them alone in the center of the station. No one could get off a shot without risking getting shot at the same time.
“More are headed our way,” Finn quietly cautioned Throttle.
Jack spoke, keeping his pistol leveled on Throttle. “You know, I think that’s some coincidence you show up and, not an hour later, one of my ships is stolen. And I don’t believe in coincidences.”
“I don’t either. My guess is that if the thief didn’t come from your shop, someone snuck on board my ship and hitched a ride here.”
“Possibly. But I find it hard to believe that one person could unlock a ship from the dock—especially when I control the dock system—sneak aboard, and pilot a ship away from the station, all without being noticed. Don’t you find it hard to believe?”
“I’ve seen some pretty crazy things in my time to find anything hard to believe anymore,” she said.
The sounds of bootsteps pounding toward them made Throttle inwardly cringe. She should’ve killed Jack and run the instant the worker had alerted him, but she’d been as surprised as Jack had been. Sylvian hadn’t sent her double-click through the comm-chips to let the team know that she was safely back on board the Javelin. The High Spirit was supposed to wait until the Javelin departed, not the other way around. Throttle suspected the worst, that Punch had killed Sylvian after she disabled the Atlas network on his ship, and then he rabbited.
She’d go after Punch, but first, she had to find a way off the station. The sounds of rifles being raised around her didn’t help her think.
“You’re surrounded. Drop your weapons,” Jack said.
“I’d rather die with a gun in my hand than die on my knees,” Finn said.
“I’d rather not die,” Throttle muttered under her breath at her partner. She didn’t take her eyes off Jack and forced her next words to sound as menacing as possible. “The question you should be asking yourself, Jack, is this: Can they kill me before I kill you?”
He glared, but she could see fear behind his façade.
She continued, “Instead of shooting each other until only one person is left standing, how about we all lower our weapons and talk?”
Jack guffawed. “Why? So you can try to convince me you don’t have anything to do with stealing one of my ships?”
Throttle opened her mouth to retort, but she was cut off by a metallic screech. Everyone’s focus shot up to see the massive cutter tear free from one of its two support beams. Its focused laser beam was now carving lines into the floor and up the walls. Three of the Javelin’s round bots, each armed with a laser pen, had cut through the first beam and were now burning a thin line through the last remaining beam.
“Shoot those bots!” Jack yelled.
“Cut the power to the chopper before it cuts through the hull!” someone else screamed.
Throttle spared the briefest of glimpses at Finn before the pair sprinted out of the fatal funnel of shooters that were now engaged with a machine that had already burned a hole through several levels.
Throttle and Finn weaved through workers who were scrambling to save the station. She pushed a man out of her way, and he was shot a split second later. She glanced over her shoulder to see one of Jack’s goons running after them, firing haphazardly in their direction. Finn stopped, spun around, leveled his pistol, and fired. The goon collapsed.
Throttle reached the stairs and used her leg blades to spring over several steps at a time. She paused when she reached the walkway to cover Finn as he caught up to her. She noticed that only a single bot remained, but it was spinning wildly and leaving a trail of smoke.
“Our diversion is about done for,” she said as soon as Finn reached her.
“We have the higher ground. They’ll have a harder time hitting us,” he said.
Several shots whizzed by.
“But they can still hit us,” Throttle said, and the pair ran.
They weaved around crates, dodging after every near miss.
As they drew closer to Javelin’s open airlock doors, Throttle noticed a worker sitting against the dock-control computer. He held his hand to a bloody gash on the back of his head. As soon as he saw Throttle, he swung out to trip her, but she’d seen him and hurdled over his reach just in time. Finn kicked the worker in the head as he ran by, and the man collapsed in a heap.
She hurried through the outer airlock door, nearly tripping, as a small gap was growing between the station and the ship. Behind her, Finn tumbled as the vacuum sucked him to the growing gap. Throttle dropped her pistol, grabbed onto the Javelin’s inner airlock door with one hand and reached out with her other hand. She grabbed his hand and used all her strength to pull him to her. The instant he was through, the ship’s outer door closed, sealing them safely away from the station.
“Thanks, Rusty. Initiate autopilot and get us out of here,” Throttle said in between breaths.
“I have the flight controls, and you’ll feel our transition to sub-speed in nine seconds. It’s good to have you both back. I was worried,” Rusty said.
“Aw, Rusty, you were worried about us?” Finn asked drily.
“I was worried that I’d be chopped up into parts. I saw what was taking place within that station. It’s a slaughterhouse.”
He blew out a breath. “Figures.”
The ship around Throttle vibrated roughly. If she hadn’t been on her butt already, she would’ve ended up on it with Rusty’s accelerated launch. Finn grabbed onto the wall to keep from tumbling. When the vibrations ended, she stood and looked out the airlock window to see the airlock at the station closing. Debris and at least one person had been sucked out. She grimaced and turned to open the inner door and head to the bridge.
Eddy came running to meet her in the hallway.
She grabbed his shoulder. “Good thinking, using the bots back there. You saved our lives.”
He took a step back. “All three are offline. Were you able to grab any of them?”
“We were too busy running for our lives.”
He huffed. “You know how many months it takes Rusty to build a single bot?”
He didn’t wait for her answer and instead turned to walk away.
“Hey,” Finn called out after Eddy, “is Sylvian on the bridge?”
Eddy waved him off. “She didn’t come back. I suppose she’s still with Punch.”
Finn stiffened and his jaw clenched. His blank stare seemed to hold back a tumultuous ocean of dread and rage.
Throttle shook off the sudden chills and took determined steps to the bridge. “Rusty, plot a course to follow the High Spirit.”
Chapter Eighteen
“I can’t believe you hit me,” Punch said while he rubbed his chin.
“You’re lucky I didn’t shoot you,” Sylvian snapped back from where she stood as far from him as she could on the bridge of the High Spirit.
“You’re lucky you didn’t try,” he countered, his hand still hovering over his holster.
When Sylvian spoke again, he noticed trepidation blanketing her anger. “I wasn’t going to shoot you,” she said softer than before. “You just made me so mad back there. I’ve never punched anybody before.”
He chuckled and turned back to his screen. “I tend to have that effect on people.”
“I’m beginning to see how you earned your nickname,” she said drily.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her take cautious steps forward until she reached the copilot’s station.
“I disabled the Atlas net. What else do you need from me?” she asked.
He looked up then and watched her carefully. “Are you as good as Throttle says you are?”
Sylvian crossed her arms over her chest. “Of course I am, but why would I help you? You kidnapped me.”
He waved her off. “I didn’t kidnap you. You can communicate with your crew any time you want. I’m just leveraging another Peacekeeper’s skills during a time of need.”
She watched him, dubious. “So I can ping the Javelin and tell them what you did to me?”
He chortled. “I didn’t do anything to you. I’m just giving you a lift to Free Station. You were heading there already.”
“With my crew on the Javelin,” she said.
“Semantics. Don’t worry. You’ll be back with your hubby in no time at all. Until then, you’ll help me take back Free Station, starting with—”
“No,” she interrupted firmly. “I won’t help you until I talk with my crewmates.”
“Fine. Go ahead. Being a specialist, I’m sure you can figure out how to run the comms.”
He held his tongue while he mirrored her screen to watch her navigate the High Spirit’s communications screens and ping the Javelin. He was impressed at the speed with which she worked the system.
Barely a second had passed before her call was accepted.
“Punch, if you’ve hurt even a hair on my crew member’s head—”
Punch looked at Sylvian and held up his hands in surrender, choosing silence as the better path. Sylvian tried to ignore him as she interrupted Throttle. “It’s me, Throttle. I’m calling you from the High Spirit.”
“I see that. Are you hurt?”
“No, I’m fine,” the specialist said.
“I’m curious as to why you’re on that ship and not here with us on the Javelin.”
