by M. D. Cooper
Katrina took the offered hand and smiled. “With equal respect, Captain, I grant your request and also wish you well.”
Over the next two hours, the activity in and around the cluster of ships was both efficient and constant. Katrina was pleased to hear that Demy would be staying with the Castigation, and laughed when she received Malorie’s message:
While Rama stated her preference to remain with the Voyager, Carl surprised Katrina by requesting to fill the position of chief engineer on the Verisimilitude. Rubbing his hands together, he smiled brightly. “Can’t wait to get my hands all over her engines.”
Rama rolled her eyes. “You sound pornographic, Carl.”
Troy maintained a dignified silence for once.
All-in-all, the ships needed for the crew returning to Persia were only four. Two of the MDF ships and two of the canton frigates were sent back with about a third of the crew from the eight frigates and half of the MDF crew, the rest choosing to send only their uniforms back as proof of their choice to remain with Cavalry One.
Katrina could not help but smile at the large number of people who opted to remain with her. Now she just needed to get them to a safe haven and organize them for…what? She laughed at herself because beyond waiting and watching out for the Intrepid, she almost didn’t know.
Almost.
Whatever came next, she knew for certain that she would not be idle while other hapless victims emerged from Kapteyn’s Streamer to be robbed of all their belongings and sold into slavery.
Her grip on the edge of the holotank tightened as she watched the ships heading back toward Persia.
Troy forwarded her orders with a one hour countdown and asked on their private channel,
Katrina suddenly realized she knew exactly where and exactly how to get there.
Troy’s concern was tempered with the memory of how the mystery voice had helped them and saved Katrina’s life.
While privately, Katrina thought, I hope you’re right, Troy, because I have to be here when the Intrepid comes through. There is more than just myself now.
But even she didn’t know what she meant.
HIT AND RUN
STELLAR DATE: 11.17.8537 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: Orfa Shipping Freighter, Kessmar
REGION: Outer fringes of the Fremer System
Twenty-five years later…
Katrina stood in the captain’s cabin aboard the Kessmar, an Industries freighter. She was staring at a tabletop, watching lines of data and files scrolling across the plas, while Troy transferred anything useful to the Voyager.
Outside the cabin, the sounds of pulse fire and yelling in the distance grew louder then quieter again. She heard a blood-curdling, high-pitched, mechanical ‘Aaaaaaiiiieeee’, and laughed softly. Malorie had truly embraced her inner pirate.
“Lady Katrina, Captain Norm says all decks have been cleared, and the remaining Kessmar crew is in full lockdown without net access.”
Katrina turned to the major standing in the doorway. “Thank you, Aerns, I’m almost done here. Tell Norm we will meet him in the shuttle bay in thirty minutes.”
She smiled as she responded to the man’s salute and turned back to the table.
Katrina was always careful to be the most anonymous member of the Cavalry, and never spoke on the combat net during a raid. Even the possibility that a single member of the captured crew would realize who she was could be the end of them all. Knowing that the much-hunted Golden Age Woman and her ship were part of a pirate organization would make the Cavalry the largest bounty in the Orion Arm.
Katrina’s avatar made a face at Troy’s, but she touched the hacked console, releasing a small stream of nano to destroy the hardware in the now wiped computer. the Cavalry did not risk leaving clues behind. It was always her practice to go through a captain’s personal computer, where the best information on trading ports, cargos, and shipping routes were kept. It was also the Cavalry’s primary source of news, beyond their self-imposed exile. They had made many successful raids based on that information and found several friendly connections as well.
For twenty-five years, the Cavalry had been methodically building their reputation among the black market merchants as a trustworthy source of valuable goods. They were known for loyalty returned in an equal measure to what was given, and also for being ruthlessly vengeful when crossed.
The information had also helped the Cavalry become an anonymous group known for aggressive attacks on those found to be trading in slaves. More than a few Streamers had found themselves unknowingly rescued by the mysterious faceless pirates.
Having secured the list, Katrina walked back through the ship, surrounded by her security team and thinking about the information they had just found. She was not paying attention to more than keeping up with the two soldiers in front of her, when a shudder went through the deck plate, and the ship slewed to port.
She almost fell, but the woman behind her reached out to grab her arm.
“What the hell was that?!”
Major Aerns growled out the order for the team to double-time it back to the bay, and the soldiers picked up the pace, weapons drawn, ready for anything.
Katrina broke her own protocol and called back to the Verisimilitude.
A small rumble punctuated his comment, and then Troy and the Verisimilitude’s AI, Kimber, were talking over each other.
As Troy spoke, Katrina’s team reached the docking bay, and she looked past her shuttle to see Norm standing in the airlock of his own, looking anxiously in her direction.
Her pilot, Dass, was already buckled in, spurred on by the increasing rumble of the Kessmar. Katrina pulled herself into the shuttle, and the last member of her team to board hit the control to close the hatch.
Dass had the little ship moving before the seal was complete and she turned a questioning face to Katrina, who looked past the pilot to see Norm’s shuttle clearing the mouth of the bay. Choosing not to verbally respond to Dass’s unspoken question, she threw herself into the nearest seat and nodd
ed as she pulled the safety belts over her chest.
The shuttle pushed through the ES field, banking sharply as the bay began a slow turn—likely due to plasma venting in the engineering section.
Dass cursed under her breath. “Maybe next time, you don’t kill the captain or trigger a self-destruct sequence before everyone is safely away, yeah? God’s breath, we almost kissed the deck with the starboard side of the shuttle!”
Katrina said nothing, but stared down the pilot until she looked away.
It was Norm’s responsibility to get control of the bridge once the first team boarded. Locking down the command structure was crucial to breaking through resistance. Usually, a captain or the first mate would order a general surrender to avoid loss of life once they heard that their cargo was the only thing the raiding party was after. Norm would then explain that their ship would be disabled, but in some repairable fashion—just enough to allow the Cavalry a clean getaway before any attempts of pursuit or retaliation could be made.
Norm also made the call when it came to sparing the lives of the command team. The decision was based on his risk assessment, and Katrina did not interfere. Along with Jordan, the three of them were the ruling members of the Cavalry. She would not allow internal conflict that could endanger their security and success.
It was still hard to trust herself after all the blood she had shed in Midditerra, but that, too, was something she would not allow to interfere with the Cavalry’s security. For Katrina, this was a temporary life that would end when she finally found Tanis and the Intrepid, but for the rest of these people, it was most likely the only life they would ever know. It was paramount that a well-developed hierarchy be long-established before the Golden Age Woman and her ship jumped out for the last time.
She closed her eyes. Troy only called her that when he was about to give her bad news. What could be worse than potentially being vaporized by the explosion of a freighter’s fusion engines? Were they too late to get away?
Her heart was heavy at the thought of so much death, but she would not question Norm’s decision, not even in a private conversation with Troy.
She didn’t reply. Her brain forced away the meaning of what she had just been told. She checked the distance to the Voyager and kept her mind focused on getting her people and ships to safety.
Katrina reached out on the combat net to the commanders of the two ships loaded with the cargo from this run that would be traded.
She had never been able to get anyone except Norm and Jordan to drop the habit.
But Gavetts was never that compliant.
The tone of the commander’s thoughts were colored with her irritation, but Katrina knew Gavetts would follow the orders even if she did not like them. Right now, that’s all that mattered.
It was a phrase they all said when parting. Katrina didn’t remember exactly when it had started, but it was a comforting way of saying goodbye out in the black, where a safe journey was at risk from so many directions.
Dass was easing the shuttle into the Voyager as Katrina finished her conversations. Troy’s voice came over the ship’s comm.
“Everyone, stay put. We are doing a hard burn to make the transition point for a safe drop to FTL.”
The shuttle had just locked onto the deck, when it felt as though a great weight was pushing against Katrina. It increased until she had to close her eyes against the force, pressing her into the back of her seat and forcing the air out of her lungs.
She checked the thrust and saw that the Voyager was boosting at thirty gs—which meant that the Kessmer must have blown sooner than expected. A lot sooner.
Another brush with death.
For a moment, the pressure in her ears was the only sound she could hear. Then there was a slight easing of the weight before it lifted altogether, like a heavy object being taken off her chest. When her hearing returned, she could make out the sounds of heavy breathing from the other five people in the cabin, but no one made a move to rise. She always worried about the crewmembers who were not augmented, when maneuvers like this were made.
Then all motion ceased, and Katrina knew they were in the dark layer.
If an AI could sound angry, Troy was that AI.
Katrina grit her teeth for the walk to her cabin, nodding to any crew she passed along the way. She was doing her best to act as if the narrow escape was nothing out of the usual and had not scared the hell out of her, but it just added to her exhaustion.
When she entered her quarters, the light was already a dim, soft amber, just bright enough for her to see her bunk.
So Troy is not too angry with me, she thought.
She pulled off her gear, dropping it on the small table next to the san, which she ignored in favor of the sleep her body and mind was craving.
She pulled off her shipsuit as she plopped down, bending forward to release her boots, and kicked everything off, falling back on her pillow with a sigh.
As sleep began to envelop her mind, she thought she heard Troy say,
Was that anger?
Katrina’s mind refused to consider it before her body gave a final, soft sigh into the oblivion of sleep.
* * * * *
Katrina stood under a tree, watching the breeze ripple the water across the lake. Her bare feet hugged the lush spring grass, and she smiled as a winge
d creature with bright blue feathers swooped down toward the water so fast that she barely perceived it. The giant bird caught a fish and flew back into the air, curving gracefully away. She watched until the bird went over a curve in the hills.
In her mind, she heard the words of her mantra, and whispered, “I am the soft reed that grows along the shore. One foot in the river, one on land. I bend in the wind, I weather the flood, I persist, I survive. I touch all these things, I live in their worlds, but they are not me, and I am not them. My beliefs and persistence are my absolution. I am Katrina.”
As her whisper trailed away, an angry voice behind her said, “Liar!”
With a startled gasp, she turned around and saw herself. But not a mirror image. This was a different woman.
This woman wore thigh-high boots and a skintight sheath dress, both made of the same glowing white, shimmering material. She had white hair with electric lavender streaks hugging the curls and lavender eyes to match. Tracing up the bridge of her nose and over her forehead into her hairline were studs that sparkled like diamonds. She was a Lumin.
Katrina’s eyes grew wide with recognition; she was looking at herself as she had appeared at her twenty-third anniversary party, when her father had told her he was going to put her skill as a spy to work and send her to watch the Noctus.
The Lumin Katrina nodded with a sarcastic curl to her mouth. “You recognize yourself, and you are no ‘soft reed’ swaying in the wind,” she snarled with disdain. “You pretend to be someone who is not like her ancestors, but you cannot deny your blood. You are your true self when it suits your needs; Verisa, Warlord, Lady Katrina.”
Her eyes looked Katrina up and down. “How long do you think the high-minded benevolent disguise will last this time? How long before you drop this pretense and make use of all these lesser souls to serve your needs?”
“Stop!”
Another version of Katrina came forward and held up a hand in admonition to the Lumin Katrina. This was an older, softer woman wearing a long tunic befitting a stateswoman of Victoria, carrying herself with poise and authority.