Rogue Stars

by C Gockel et al.

  “Like we already do? So what, you’re picky all of a sudden? How is she different from the guns, supplies, and drugs we run?”

  “That cargo doesn’t punch me in the balls, for one. And it sure doesn’t tell tales. You think she’s going to get where she’s going and not mention how we ferried her halfway across the system? I don’t need the heat.”

  “She’s different,” Fran said softly. She frowned and jumped her gaze about the galley, searching for any rhyme or reason where there likely wasn’t any. At least none that I wanted to get dragged into.

  “She’s different all right.”

  “I mean—” Her green eyes narrowed with impatience. “You just have to look at her to know she’s not like the other synths.”

  I ran my tongue over my teeth. How the hell would Fran know anything about synthetics? “You’re a synth expert now, as well as my smartass second?”

  “Oh, c’mon Cale …” She stepped closer, lips pressed together. Her pulse fluttered in her neck. “We have a real-life synth on our ship. Aren’t you just the least bit curious?”

  I almost corrected her slip—Starscream was my ship—but she was gearing up for a fight and already had enough ammunition. “Curiosity doesn’t pay for repairs or fuel or food. But it will put you in prison, or worse.”

  “You’d know all about that.”

  I bowed my head and pinched my lips together before answering. Some things we never mentioned, and that was one of them.

  “Get off your fuckin’ high horse. You’re on this ship because I’m the only bastard who’ll put up with your bullshit. I want you to put some feelers out to see if Chitec is looking for her, or if anyone might bite if we dangle the bait. Let’s offload her and get out of this system.”

  Fran glowered as though this actually meant something to her. Her lithe fingers had curled into fists at her side. “I can’t do that inflight.”

  The way she spoke, through clenched teeth—damn if it didn’t divert half of my attention to a stirring in my recently bruised balls.

  “I know. That’s why we’re taking a detour. And we’re gonna drop off your passenger while we’re at it. I don’t need another body snooping around my ship.”

  “Fuck you, Cale. I told him we’d take him as far as Mimir. He paid up front, and we need that money.”

  I pinched the bridge of my nose and squeezed my eyes closed. I needed a drink, preferably something potent enough to strip paint.

  “You need that money”—when I opened my eyes, the look she gave me bordered on homicidal—“so you can keep jacking yourself up.”

  She swung at me. Fran was many things—socially astute and client bait, and she brought a certain level of class to Starscream that had won me several lucrative runs—but she’d never be a brawler. She’d broadcasted that swing through her hips, waist, shoulder, and with the snarl on her lips. I caught her wrist, yanked her around, twisted her arm behind her back, and pinned her against the countertop.

  “Don’t think I don’t know you’re dealing on the side,” I said.

  “Get the fuck off me.” She bucked and a quiver of wholly wrong desire tested my control.

  Fuck. She knew just how to push my buttons.

  I licked my lips and growled against her ear, “You might think you can slip a few packets by me here and there—” She shoved back. I wedged a knee between her legs and pinned her still. “But nothing gets off this ship without me knowing. If you jeopardize Starscream, I’ll hang you out to dry, Francisca.”

  She trembled, not from fear but rage, and likely from the remnants of phencyl—her substance of choice—running through her veins.

  “We’re selling the synth, and you’ll do it with a smile on your pretty face.”

  I pushed off and released her wrist. She whirled on me, cupped my cock—now fuckin’ hard because I’m a twisted son of a bitch—and pushed me up against the wall. Her hand—right where I needed it to be—dumped rational thought out of my head and filled it with thoughts of bending her over the countertop and doing her hard and fast. My limited imagination didn’t need any help with that one; my dick had gone from mildly interested to a raging hard-on.

  She braced her forearm against the wall and leaned all six feet of deliciously curved, viciously hard, pissed-off female temptation against me. Teeth gritted, I panted through my nose. I couldn’t speak; if I did, whatever came out wouldn’t be pleasant.

  “You dare hang me out to dry, and I’ll drag you down with me”—her hand closed and squeezed—“Captain.”

  My lips twitched. “Keep your hand right there while I fantasize, and we won’t need to fuck. I’m halfway there already.”

  She parted her mouth and flicked her tongue out over her lower lip. When she pushed in close, my very obvious need throbbed in her hand. She brushed her mouth over mine, so close I could taste her, and raked her nails down my cock with just enough force to keep it on the sweet side of pain.

  Oh, sweet-fuck.

  I clamped my lips closed. If I chased her mouth, I would next have my hand in her hair and my tongue down her throat, and there wouldn’t be any coming back from that.

  Her breath fluttered coolly against my cheek. “I’m too good for you,” she whispered.

  A quiver of lust licked through me. “Fuck me or fuck off.”

  Five seconds. I’d give her five seconds to back off. If she kept teasing me after that, I would snap.

  Four. She dragged her nails down my chest and bowed her head. Loose strands of her hair tickled my cheek, jaw, and shoulder. She smelled like cheap lavender soap, and even that had my cock twitching in her hand.

  Three. Her palm massaged me, sending tight, pleasurable pulses through my groin. I swallowed down a groan, whatever good that’d do me. She knew she had me right where she wanted me: backed against the wall with my cock in her hand. Yeah, that sounded about right. Man, if we could just fuck and be done with all this masochistic shit …

  Two.

  She removed her hand and stepped back. Her glassy green eyes appraised me. She could try to deny that she wanted me, but the truth was written in her dilated pupils and on her plump lips.

  I swallowed and breathed in, all the way down. “Get back to the bridge and do your job.”

  “Certainly, Captain.”

  She slammed the door behind her, and it bounced open again.

  “Fuck!” I picked up a can of high-protein reconstituted vegetables off the countertop and threw it at the door. A drink. I needed a drink. Searching the cupboards, I somehow ignored my pounding erection and the urge to jack off; the bitch probably expected me to and she wasn’t winning that fight. Where the hell was the alcohol? How had my impromptu meeting with my second turned into a mind-fuck of epic proportions? I’d brought up her habit; I should have known better.

  I found the emergency whiskey, planted the bottle on the countertop, braced my hands on either side, and glared. If I drank, she’d smell it on me, and she’d win that way too. Plus, there was the little problem of a priceless synth sitting in my cabin, waiting for me to … what? Say that we’d take her away from whatever problems a goddamn synthetic human being had? Drinking sure wouldn’t solve my problem of what the hell to do with her.

  “What day is it?” It has to be Monday somewhere. “Mondays blow.”

  I bowed my head and breathed in through my nose. I’d let Fran carve off some of our side profits for over a year. She’d thought she’d slipped it by me, but people talk, especially when threatened in a bar by a pissed-off smuggler-captain. She was walking a thin line. Clever? Yes, extremely—too clever, too mouthy, and too conspicuous. I’d let it go on too long.

  “Cale,” Fran’s syrupy smooth voice, laced with a hint of bitch, rolled from my wrist-comm.

  “Give a guy a break.” I tapped the comm. “Yes?” I hissed, then winced. In that one word, I’d sounded sexually repressed and aggressive, which I was, but I didn’t need to broadcast it. I imagined that smug, satisfied smile on her face.

&nb
sp; “We have fleet incoming.”

  I flew from the galley toward the bridge, the encounter with Fran instantly forgotten. Fleet. Please let this be routine. Considering how wonderfully uneventful my day had been so far, I could only assume the worst.

  Chapter Seven: #1001

  When the cabin door lock rattled, I expected Captain Shepperd to enter, not a heavy-set man dressed in technician overalls. Another member of the crew, I assumed, until facial recognition flagged a warning. The man filling Captain Shepperd’s cabin doorway was wanted for murder, among other offenses spanning six cycles and the nine systems. He leered and rolled his fat lips back from surprisingly clean teeth. Not a crewmember—a bounty hunter. He shouldn’t have been on the Starscream, unless …

  “Thought no one noticed, didn’t you?” He clicked the door closed behind him. “I saw you down on the eastside trying very hard not to be seen. Thing is”—he dragged a hand down his scar-peppered jaw—“tech like you gets noticed. No hood is gonna fool me, and I wasn’t the only one lookin’. You’ve got a whole load of attention coming your way. I was the only one smart enough to get here first.”

  Elevated heart rate. Rapid breathing. Blocking stance. Gaze darting. He would attack and soon.

  Engine noise reverberated through the floor. We were moving again, which probably meant the captain was on the bridge. The hunter and I wouldn’t be interrupted. Given enough room to move, I could disable this man, but the cramped cabin wouldn’t make it easy.

  “So, this is what we’re gonna do: at the next port, you’re leaving with me. You understand?”

  “I think you’ll find Captain Shepperd is unlikely to let me go with you.”

  “Captain Shepperd is a washed-up smuggler with no fuckin’ clue. I bet he’d be glad to wash his hands of Chitec’s castoffs, given his other business operations.”

  I am #1001, and I follow orders.

  I lunged—not for him, but for the empty glass beside Shepperd’s bunk. I scooped it up and slammed it into the bounty hunter’s cheek. The glass shattered. Jagged fragments cut deep into his flesh, and pierced my hand. Pain registered as a fleeting alert. I dismissed it. A sensation of cool delight trickled through my synthetic nervous system. I expected an error to follow and stood briefly confused when it didn’t. The hunter roared, reeled his hand back, and swung at me. Too big, too slow, too human. My thought processes worked four times faster than his.

  I ducked, sidestepped, and landed a punch to his ribs, channeling all of my available strength through synthetic flesh and muscle. Bone cracked where my knuckles struck. The trickle of delight curved my lips into a smile. The bounty hunter dropped to his knees, his mouth agape. I jerked my knee up and connected hard with his nose. Blood spurted down his face. Visual diagnostics reeled off a stream of warnings regarding the deteriorating physical condition of my victim. I sunk my hand into his hair and twisted it, then slammed his face into Shepperd’s desk. The hunter collapsed in a quiet heap. Remembering the captain’s hidden guns, I calculated whether the hunter was an asset or a hindrance, and decided to leave him out cold, but alive. Everyone is an asset.

  I straightened and lifted my hood. “I am Number One Thousand And One, and I follow orders.”

  Chapter Eight: Caleb

  “What ship is that?” I already knew the answer, but hoped Fran would lie.

  “That, Captain, is fleet-designated raptor class C, number two-zero.” Fran clicked her tongue. “One fine piece of fleet warbird badassery, and it’s currently knocking on our comms, waiting for me to answer.”

  I’d grown up watching warbirds hover over the cornfields outside Vancouver. I’d spent hours hunched over bits of plastic, strings of glue, and wonky stickers, building models of those birds. Before I’d appreciated the female form in new and exciting ways, I’d plastered raptor class posters all over my bedroom walls. Had I stayed in fleet, I’d have captained one of those; maybe not yet, but a few more years would have done it.

  “Feeling inadequate, Cale?” Fran’s smile was entirely inappropriate for the workplace.

  I gave her the middle finger. “Are they asking for me by name?”

  “Not yet, but we’ve got about thirty seconds before they get pissy and bring out the big guns.”

  Raptor Twenty loomed in the observation window, wings spread like the hovering bird of prey it was named after. We were getting the tame version of the ship. If shit went sideways, that baby would go from tame to rabid in less than sixty seconds. The weaponry tucked inside those wings would have had my nether regions all aquiver if they hadn’t been abused enough for one day.

  “I quit.” I slouched in the flight chair. “You be captain.”

  “I would, but I’m not the one they’ll want to talk to.” Fran tapped her nails on the arm of her chair. “Ten seconds. What do you want me to say?”

  “Tell them I’m not here.”

  “You can’t turn off the lights and hope they go away.” She rolled her eyes and tapped on the comms tucked into her ear. “We hear you, Twenty. Yes, we knew you were there, we were just … otherwise engaged—”

  “We could hardly fuckin’ miss ‘em,” I mumbled.

  Considering Fran had hidden Starscream on the dark side of Rhea, fleet had caught us with our pants down and looking incredibly suspicious. Hiding behind a moon tended to imply shady goings on.

  “Yes, he’s here.”

  I closed my eyes. Please, if there’s an obscure god left in some corner of this fuckin’ universe, please make the warbird go away.

  “Yes, that’s … fine, Commander. We’ll see you soon. Starscream out.”

  My heart fell through my stomach and kept right on going, dragging my guts with it. “You did not just agree to them boarding. Tell me that’s not what I heard. Because—” Deep breaths. “Because we have a synth on board.”

  Fran shrugged.

  “And a hold full of illegal weapons. You do remember that, right?” I circled my finger between our flight chairs. “You do know we’re outlaws?”

  Fran batted my hand aside and stood. “Quit your bitching. We’re not wanted in this system—yet. The guns are just a fraction of our cargo. Besides, they don’t have a warrant. They just wanna drop by and check us out because we were sitting here, behind a moon, twiddling our thumbs. If I’d said no, then we’d look even more guilty.” She sauntered to the back of the bridge. “I’m gonna go stash a few … suspicious items below board, just in case.”

  I turned my chair around, wishing I’d downed the alcohol while I’d had the chance. “Where am I going to stash the AWOL synthetic human? I can’t stuff her in a locker.” My balls couldn’t take another punch.

  “You’ll think of something.” She hesitated in the doorway, hand resting on the seal. “And you should know, Commander Shepperd will be joining us personally.”

  She ducked out the door before I could hurl abuse at her.

  I kicked the flight dash and shot from the flight chair, spitting a string of curses.

  Commander Shepperd, my holier than thou brother. I was captain of a tugship, a title that had come with the ship. He was Fleet-Kiss-My-Ass Commander.

  “What the fuck did I do to deserve this crap-ton of bad luck today?” And that was the problem: luck, good or otherwise, did not exist. Shit usually happened because the universe liked to mess with me. My brother just happened to be in the neighborhood, and just happened to be sniffing around Saturn’s moons. Something sure smelled like bullshit.

  “Cale…!” Fran yelled through my comms. I shot down the catwalk, into the rear section, and found her outside my cabin, face looking less than impressed.

  The body sprawled in my cabin was no doubt the reason for her scowl. I braced my hands on either side of the door and leaned in. No synth.

  “She’s in the ship somewhere.”

  “Thank you, Captain Obvious. Any other gems you’d like to share with the class?”

  I didn’t even have the energy for a comeback. “Go greet my brother, keep him on
the bridge and out of the hold, and the rec room, and the galley. Out of everywhere.”

  “How?”

  “I don’t know, offer to blow him.”

  “And get fleet between my teeth?” She huffed. “You blow him.”

  “Fine. I’ll talk to him. You find the synth.”

  “And him?” She kicked the limp foot hanging out the doorway.

  “Your passenger. Your problem.” I threw my hands up and left her to it.

  The sound of her sweet voice mixed with my name and a colorful array of curse words as I walked away.

  I stopped by the galley to check for the synth and found the whiskey where I’d left it. I’d need to ditch it. I poured myself a glass, downed it, poured another, and tossed the rest down the drain. I couldn’t imagine my brother lowering himself to searching through the galley for liquor, but there was little point in getting flagged for alcohol runs only for fleet to then notice my stockpile of weapons.

  “I’m so screwed.” I drowned the second glass, let it burn through a batch of nerves, and left the galley for the shuttle lock. I didn’t even have time to shave and put on my best, as if I had any. A real-life visit from a commander. Now all I had to do was bite my tongue and play nice.

  My brother ducked through the shuttle lock door and smiled as though he’d just stepped in someone’s shit but was too polite to mention it. He was wearing his casual uniform but still looked as though he should have been adorning the front cover of Fleet Bachelor e-zine.

  “Caleb-Joe.” He held out a tanned hand. His sunbaked skin tone clashed against his bright white fleet coat.

  “Brendan.” I considered not shaking his hand but figured I could try some geniality on for size. “Been on vacation, or are you so high up that you get to dock your ship on Lyra and get paid?”

  We shook. He gripped my hand as if he’d prefer to break my fingers. I squeezed back and plastered an over-the-top grin on my face.

  “I was on patrol near Lyra. There have been some … problems.” He scanned the tight airlock space, already looking for contraband.