She could almost see the wheels turning in Zavon's brain. "Then you'd better land," he said.
She'd have to deadstick the landing. She’d done that years ago as part of the Sunrunner races near the Hierarchy Moons, but that was a different situation. Far smaller ship, and landing on an airless asteroid, not on a large moon with an atmosphere.
It was going to be close. She'd have to aero brake.
No time to be afraid.
7
Alisa clenched her jaw. Leonidas and Temur had bound and gagged the unconscious pirate woman and the mafia goon. She was tempted to slap their two captives awake. She wore a holstered blazer pistol she taken from one of the fallen, as well as a stun gun, while Leonidas had a destroyer pistol.
I’ll let you know when they revive, Abelardus said in her mind. He stood off to one side with Young-Hee. He and Young-Hee had left their Starseer weapons on the Nomad, and had reluctantly taken blazer pistols from the dead.
“It had better be soon,” she muttered. “I’m ready to kick someone.”
Leonidas squeezed her shoulder. She leaned into him for a moment, then pulled away. She wanted him to hold her, but there wasn’t any time.
Temur let out his breath, and Alisa realized he’d been tenser than she’d realized. “The people who took your ship were Khouri Singh and Zavon Masters.”
“How do you know?” Alisa asked.
“Because I’ve been following them across the system.”
Leonidas gave him an appraising look. “Then you must be a bounty hunter.”
“No, Colonel—Leonidas.”
“A security agent then,” Alisa said.
I can’t read his mind, Abelardus’s voice in her head sounded surprised. Nor can Young-Hee.
He shook his head. “Not at present.”
“Law enforcement?” she asked.
Leonidas held up a hand. “Perhaps in the interest of speed, we should just let him speak,” he said.
Alisa rubbed her eyes. “You’re right.” She nodded at Temur. “Please continue.” Leonidas was right—they needed to get moving.
Temur nodded back at her. “Very well. I was Khouri Singh’s bodyguard, but that was some time ago. I was hired by her mother to follow her, and look for an opportunity to bring her back home. The problem is, Khouri doesn’t want to go home and I’ve had to resort to shadowing them, looking for the right opportunity to intervene before she and Masters go too far.”
“You mean like stealing my ship.”
Temur looked apologetic. “I’m afraid they were able to elude me here, arriving ahead of me.”
“How did you know my ship was their target?”
Temur didn’t blink. “I bugged their gear.”
That seemed pretty incredible to Alisa. She frowned. “Just like that?” She stared at him. He shrugged, which only served to annoy her.
Leonidas intervened. “Imperial Scout,” he told her. “Remember?”
“No, I don’t remember. Furthermore, friends of his stole my ship.” What had happened to Mica, Beck, Yumi and Alejandro?
“Khouri is a—.“ He paused. “Friend,” he said finally. “Masters. No.” His lips twisted in disdain, the first emotion Alisa had noticed on his face. “The man is a never-ending fountain of schemes.”
“What does that have to do with my ship being stolen?”
“Everything, I suspect.” He said the words carefully. Clearly, he was normally a man of few words, and Alisa saw he chose his as a jeweler would a fine stone. “Masters is continually attempting to improve his fortune, at the expense of others. He’s like an Earth magpie; any shiny object is something for him to pluck and add to his hoard.”
It hit Alisa then. “You mean he was the supposed Nova Culinary systems contact?”
“Very likely. I don’t know the details. Being implanted in Khouri’s coat, my surveillance device didn’t pick up every conversation. What I learned was that Masters spun his usual web of deceit with Khouri, telling her that they were liberating a stolen cargo-a medical lab that he claimed belonged to the humanitarian foundation he ran.”
Temur looked like he wanted to spit in disgust, but refrained.
Leonidas scratched his head, brows furrowed. “So, she was manipulated into stealing the Star Nomad?”
Temur nodded. “For the cargo she thought it carried.”
“A spice lab?” Alisa asked. “She just wanted something valuable.”
“Zavon told her it was medical supplies.”
Alisa snorted. “And she believed him?”
Temur’s gaze flicked away from her’s for an instant, settling on their two captives. “Khouri has a blind spot when it comes to Masters.”
Alisa poked the unconscious mafia goon with her boot. “If this guy’s mafia is to be believed, then the spice lab was stolen from the Crimson Pirates by Dazzle Club.”
“Then Protection Incorporated apparently stole it from the Dazzle Club,” Temur added.
Alisa shook her head. “Just how many times has this spice lab been stolen?” She imagined a chain of thefts stretching back in time. She frowned. It didn’t really matter. What mattered was getting her ship back, and any crew still on board, hopefully still alive. Worry ran through her. If they weren’t, she’d be avenging their deaths. She owed Mica, Yumi and Beck so much, and they had all also become dear friends. Alejandro may be annoying, but he didn’t deserve to die, either. She still had a faint hope that they had gone off on one of Beck’s culinary forays, a re-victualling or whatever Tommy might call it, and not been on board when the theft happened. But the fact that they hadn’t answered their comms was a sign that something had happened to them.
She clenched her jaw. “Singh and Masters, would they kill to take the ship?” She glared at Temur, who didn’t flinch in the face of her anger.
“Khouri would not.”
“Really? She wouldn’t kill to get what she wanted?”
“Not a theft, no.”
“What about Masters? Would he?”
Temur frowned. “Truly, I do not know. Perhaps. If he thought the situation warranted it.”
“Not exactly reassuring,” Leonidas said. “This Masters, you are saying he might readily kill, if necessary?”
“I fear my own prejudices toward the man bias my judgement, but yes, I believe he might.”
Fear stabbed at Alisa, but she pushed it away. “In other words, we don’t know. It’s even possible that our idiots actually left the ship, and that doing the stupid thing might have kept them from dying.”
“Except they didn’t answer your calls,” Leonidas said.
“I know.”
Temur continued. “As I said, Khouri would not kill your crew. Masters…I do not know. It would depend upon the circumstances.”
Alisa thought furiously. “How do we go after the Nomad?” She looked at Temur. “Wait, you said something about a bug.”
“Yes, but its range is limited to a few hundred miles.”
“Damn. Okay, then how did these pirates know to come here?” She snapped her fingers. “Of course, the spice lab is bugged. So, they must have tracker, wherever that is. But where?”
Leonidas’s grim expression gave way to a slight smile. “The logical place for such a tracker would be aboard a spaceship.”
She slapped her head. “I should have seen that.”
His expression softened. “You’ve had other considerations.”
“Yes, but I should have…” she trailed off. Speaking of other considerations, there was the matter of Jelena and Stanislav. “We would be advised to hurry,” Temur said, as though reading her thoughts.
She was pretty sure he wasn’t a Starseer, but she was equally sure her face was an open book at the moment. “Yes, you’re right.”
She turned to Leonidas and shook her head. “I have so much running through my head right now.”
He opened his arms and pulled her in for a hug.
She closed her eyes, let herself get lost in the warm strength of
his embrace, and then pulled back. “Thank you.” She looked at Temur, who stood waiting, expressionless. There was no judgement in those dark eyes of his, just watchful waiting. She guessed he must be a very patient and persistent man. He would be a formidable foe, and a very useful ally. “You’ll work with us to bring back my ship?” She asked him.
Temur nodded. “I only ask that I be allowed to be the one to deal with Khouri.”
“She and her companion are thieves,” Leonidas said, his voice suddenly tight with disapproval bordering on anger. His control was slipping. In a way, it was a measure of how far he had come, emotionally, from when she had first met him, all those months ago.
Alisa clasped his arm, squeezed. “The important thing is making sure our friends are okay and our ship is recovered.”
He nodded.
There was still the fading hope that perhaps Beck and the crew who had stayed behind on the Nomad had left before the ship was stolen. Alisa raised her comm and tried to reach the crew one more time. “Beck, come in. This is Alisa. Mica, come in. This is Alisa. Yumi, please answer. This is Alisa.”
But there was no answer. The silent response hung in the air before her. Mica and the others must have been on the ship when Masters and Singh stole it. She swallowed, took a deep breath.
“They are aboard the Nomad,” she said. She couldn’t bring herself to add, either alive or dead. They either were or weren’t, and worrying about it now wouldn’t make any difference.
There was a groan from the floor.
The woman is waking up, Abelardus commented in Alisa’s mind.
“Thanks for the heads-up.”
The woman’s eyes fluttered open, then widened as her gaze darted around, taking in her surroundings.
Alisa knelt down beside the woman, tapped her in the chest. “Where’s your ship?”
The woman stared at her, eyes narrowing.
Alisa pulled down the woman’s gag. “Well?”
“I’m not telling you!” The woman screeched.
The Crimson Star Pirates have a space tug in orbit, Abelardus said in her mind, a triumphant edge to his voice. The qui-gorn she must have taken has worn off.
“You mean you aren’t going to mention the space tug?” Alisa asked the woman, and made a tsk-tsk sound.
“The pirates have a shuttle in Bay 47,” Young-Hee said quietly.
“Damn it!” the pirate woman swore. “That isn’t fair.” She jerked and glared at Abelardus. “I should have taken more qui-gorn. Damn stuff never worked well on me.”
“Life’s not fair,” Alisa said. “Otherwise you idiots wouldn’t have come into ours.” The pirates obviously knew the Nomad had Starseers aboard.
She glanced at Abelardus and Young-Hee. “Is there a tracking system on board the space tug?”
They nodded in unison.
“Hey, stop that!” The pirate woman struggled to stand wearing handcuffs. She staggered to her feet, and started yelling. “Help, help!”
Alisa rolled her eyes. “Really? Who’s going to come?”
The woman ignored her and continued yelling. She tried to hop away from Leonidas’s grasp, but tripped and fell. She scrambled away on all fours.
Alisa drew the stun gun she had taken from a dead mafia goon and put a round into the pirate woman, and then another one just because she was annoyed. The woman flopped to the floor, unconscious once more.
Really? Abelardus asked her mentally.
“You didn’t even tell me her name,” Alisa said. She frowned at the others.
Leonidas shrugged. “I don’t blame you,” he said.
“Nor I,” Temur said.
“She was annoying,” Young-Hee agreed.
“Okay, so we take the shuttle, ’borrow’ the Crimson Star Pirates’ tug, and use the tracking system on board.” It was a thin enough hope, but she’d hang on to it.
“What if there is another Crimson Star Pirate vessel?” Leonidas asked gently. “Or a mafia ship?”
That was a good question. Alisa looked at Abelardus and Young-Hee. “Any idea?”
“If someone hadn’t stunned a certain prisoner, I could have scanned her now,” Abelardus said.
“I figured you had already found that out from her mind.”
“Not in this case. Neither of us know. We might of if she’d remained conscious. If you want to wait around for more than a few minutes, we might learn when she revives.”
“So, I was annoyed.” Alisa holstered her stun gun. “We don’t have time for maybes.” She looked at Leonidas. “If we encounter another ship, pirate or mafia, we’ll have to improvise,” she replied. Hopefully it wouldn’t come to that. If there were, and they got to the Nomad before Alisa, Leonidas, Abelardus, Young-Hee and Temur did, then all bets were off. She pushed the thought away. There wasn’t anything to do about that at the moment.
“We should leave at once,” Temur said. “In case there are other Crimson Star Pirates here on Sherran Moon.”
Alisa nodded. “The Nomad is getting further away, too, the longer we stay here.” She paused. “But first, I need to contact my father,” she said.
“Do we have the time to pick them up? It would seem unlikely,” Leonidas added.
“No. I need to give him an update.” She pulled Leonidas aside, away from the others. “I want him to take care of Jelena.”
He nodded. “They’ll be safer at the park.”
The surviving mafia goon stirred and opened his eyes.
Alisa walked over and looked down at him. “Are you going to stay still, or do I need to stun you?”
The goon said something, but the gag muffled his words.
He said he’ll be still, Abelardus commented in her mind.
“Good,” she said. She walked back to where Leonidas stood, and commed Stanislav. “Dad, are you there?” No answer. She tried again, and waited, suddenly worried.
“Hello, Alisa. We are.” Alisa could hear giggling in the background. “Jelena and I are playing hide and seek.”
“Isn’t that rather hard for telepaths?”
“It’s good training,” he said. “But, yes, it is.”
There was a shriek and then laughter.
“One moment, Jelena,” Alisa heard Stanislav say. “I was just ambushed,” he told her.
Alisa breathed a sigh of relief at this. Well, at least someone was having fun.
“Listen Dad, we have a situation here.”
“Yes?”
“The Nomad is missing.”
“How? Who?”
“We believe we know who the thieves are and are in pursuit, but it will take us off Sherran Moon and I don’t have time to pick you up.”
“Mom!” Jelena was suddenly talking into Stanislav’s comm. “You can’t leave us!”
“I have to, honey. We don’t have any time, and it might get dangerous.”
She could hear the pout in Jelena’s voice. “We’ve been in worse situations, Mom. You know that.”
Yes, she did, but that didn’t mean she wanted to bring Jelena into another one.
“Not this time, honey,” she said firmly. “That’s how it’s going to be. Meanwhile, stay with your grandfather.”
Leonidas came over and spoke into Alisa’s comm. “Stanislav, I’m transferring credits into your account now.”
Alisa was grateful that her father had agreed to having an account they could put money in if the need arose. Like now.
“Thank you,” Stanislav said.
“Certainly,” replied Leonidas. “I suggest using it to extend your stay at Cosmic Wonders.”
“But I don’t want to stay anymore,” Jelena whined.
“Please, honey,” Alisa said, “you have to. For me. And to keep an eye on your grandpa. Okay?”
“All right, I will,” she said. “This time.”
Despite everything, Alisa found herself smiling. “Deal,” she said.
Leonidas carried the once-more unconscious pirate woman over one shoulder, while Temur marched the bound mafia
goon in front of him. Alisa, Abelardus and Young-Hee followed behind. By the time they had reached the pod where Bay 47 was located, the pirate woman had woken and Leonidas put her down.
Alisa walked up to her. “Any chance you will help us out?”
The woman glared at her.
Alisa pulled down the pirate woman’s gag. “You do want to keep all your body parts, don’t you?” Alisa asked.
The woman’s eyes narrowed. “You aren’t the type to cut people up.”
“You sure?”
A nasty grin spread across the woman’s face. “I sure am.”
“What’s your name?” Alisa asked.
“I’m not telling you.”
Apparently, she has a number of names, Abelardus said. None of them are pleasant.
“Maybe I’ll just call you Screechy, then,” Alisa told her.
Screechy’s lips twisted into a snarl. “That’s a stupid name.”
“Then it fits you,” Alisa said. She was tired of the woman’s mule-headedness.
They reached the shuttle. The hatched was locked.
“I don’t suppose you are going to help us get in?” Alisa asked Screechy.
“No.”
Temur produced a thin, reed-like device and ran it over the door. A green light flicked on the device, and the door unsealed.
“That’s handy,” Alisa commented. "I'd like one of those for when someone hogs the toilet." She rolled her eyes at Leonidas, who pretended not to notice the jibe.
Temur nodded gravely. “I am afraid that Khouri has another just like it,” he said.
So that was how the woman had broken into the Nomad, assuming that Beck and company hadn’t actually left the cargo ramp down.
They filed into the shuttle. The interior was cramped, with lots of exposed tubing and conduits. It looked like it had seen numerous uses of energy weapons. Burn marks dotted the walls and ceiling.
Before the hatch could close, Screechy made a break for it. Leonidas grabbed at her, but she ducked and scampered toward the closing hatch.
Alisa stunned her before she could reach it.
“This is getting old,” Alisa said. She glanced at her stun gun. “Still has a few charges left.” She went into the cockpit, turned on the system, and surveyed the indicators.
Spice Crimes Page 7