Of Sea and Stars (Partners Book 3)

by Melissa Good

  She clenched her fingers with all their strength and felt the windpipe crush as she got her boots up against the wall and exploded backwards, taking the front of the enemy soldier’s throat with her, air and blood and all.

  She flipped upside down and landed, sweeping around fully with her rifle aimed in one hand and the other dripping with red stained cartilage.

  April stood over the second soldier, or actually, half standing on him, the curved knife in her hand likewise bloodstained.

  The doorway was full of Drake’s Bay staff, all armed, with nothing left for them to use them on.

  Jess’s opponent slid down the wall with a rattle of broken armor, his body shuddering helplessly as he bled out and died.

  A moment of silence. Then Jess let her rifle drop a little. “Everyone okay?” She looked over at the console as Dev’s blonde head appeared, and then Doug’s, and she blinked in relief as she let her gaze continue around the room.

  “Might have gotten a hangnail,” April said reflectively before she got off the soldier and kneeled to pull his helmet off. “Doug, need an ID.”

  Jess released her grip and let the bits of flesh and cartilage drop to the ground, shaking her hand a little to get some of the gore off it. “So.” She regarded her family grimly. “Someone have something they’d like to tell me now?”

  Her body was still twitching. She was still seeing in that colorless, flat monochrome. Still in the zone, and they saw it. Though Interforce was an integral part of the life of Drake’s Bay they didn’t often get to see it this up close and personal.

  That was the whole point, wasn’t it? You gathered everyone like her up and pointed them at the enemy. Home became an abstract, something agents kidded each other about over drinks when one of the regional differences surfaced.

  “Well?” she prompted. “That second shot was for you, not for me. And they came up through the family quarters, not from the main hall.”

  “How do you know that, Jess?” Max got slowly up, looking shaken.

  Jess tilted her head a little. “I used to live here. I know where that back door goes to, Uncle Max.”

  “No, I...” He lifted a hand. “I mean, how did you know they were shooting at us? Could have been the console, or the rest of your lot. Or maybe you were right and you were the target.”

  Reasonable. Jess nodded at him. “Because I saw his eyes, and the angle of inclination on the igniter in that blaster,” she replied. “He couldn’t see the techs from where he was standing, from his height.” She looked over at the console. “Dev, get his scan please.”

  “Yes.” Dev came around the console with her scanner and went to the other soldier, pulling the remains of the helmet aside and regarding the twisted look of terror frozen now on the man’s face. The armor was hardened resin, meant to block blaster fire, and it had, the surface covered in char.

  But she had seen Jess attack him, close in, using his own weapon to smash the armor directly and she understood why their side, her side, had an advantage in all this fighting. She captured the chip scan from his hand. No matter how armored and how much larger these soldiers seemed, Jess was stronger than they were and absolutely fearless.

  “No,” Jake said. He was sitting on the floor near the wall where he’d thrown himself on Jess’s warning. “She’s right it was us. They never would have sent just two if they’d known she was here.” He let out a long, shaky breath. “Jess, we don’t know.”

  Jess went over and crouched down next to him. “Don’t know or won’t tell?” she asked in a conversational tone.

  “Don’t know. It got too deep too fast,” he admitted. “We thought we knew what we were doing, then it just went south and Jimmy stopped telling me stuff. Said it was too much.”

  Sounds in the hallway behind the watching guards brought Jess up to her feet, and both she and April moved toward the door, bringing weapons up.

  The guards parted, though, and three big men in black overalls entered, carrying a limp figure in gray and blue. They shoved the figure forward and let it land on the ground, it’s head cracked and covered in blood. “Think we found who let them in, Drake.” The first of the three said. “His cred’s on the back door out there. One of Jimmy’s boys.”

  Jess studied the figure. “Thanks, Mike. Did you crack his head or did they?”

  “Wasn’t me, but I woulda,” he responded promptly. “Sorry I missed all the drama, Drake. I was cleaning up the backyard.”

  “Jess.”

  Jess turned on hearing Dev’s voice. “What’s up?”

  “I have access to this system now if you wish to see it,” Dev said, once again seated behind the console. “I have started a dump to the carrier.”

  “Hey.” Mike started forward. “What’s she doin’ there!”

  Jess was already at Dev’s side, sliding into the seat next to her. “She’s cracking into the Bay’s systems for me.” She put her gun down and peered at the screen, then paused and sat up. “You know something? I’m an idiot.”

  Dev eyed her. “Excuse me?”

  “I could have just logged in for ya,” Jess muttered. “I have creds here.” She glanced at Mike as he came over. “But hey, this made you look better.” She reviewed the data coming into the screen. “Mike, this is Dev. My partner.”

  Mike braced his hands on the console. “So that’s the bio alt.”

  “Yes. Hello,” Dev responded.

  “Mike’s the head of security for the Bay, Dev.” Jess flipped through the pages on Dev’s tab. “He’s supposed to make sure no one can get into their systems or anything else.”

  “Gee thanks, Drake,” Mike said. “Since they locked me out of half the crap around here, I don’t guarantee anything.”

  “Locked you out?”

  “Said it was need to know, and I didn’t need to know. Business stuff,” he responded in an indignant tone. “Bullshit.”

  “I relayed the IDs through my rig,” Doug said. “Got a squirt. They want to talk to you, Jess.”

  “Bet they do.” Jess propped her chin up on her fist. “Dev, can you rig a relay here, so we can do vid?”

  “I think so, yes.” Dev put her hands on the control surface. “I’ll have to import the crypto keys from the carrier, it will take a few minutes.” She glanced at Jess. “Wouldn’t you rather go there and do it?”

  Jess drummed her fingertips on the console. “Would you rather I do that?” She asked, after a pause.

  “Yes.”

  “Let’s go.” Jess stood up. “Everyone else stay here.” She headed for the entry. “We’ll be right back.”

  IT TOOK THEM almost fifteen minutes to get to the carrier. Jess kept getting stopped on the way, people in the overalls of the Bay going out of their way to greet her and get a word in.

  By the time they opened the hatch Jess was making faces, and she immediately hit the door seal as soon as they cleared it. “Shitcakes.”

  Dev breathed a sigh of relief as she settled into her station, swinging the chair around to face Jess. “I’m glad we’re here.”

  Jess sat down in her seat and regarded her. “You are?”

  “Yes.”

  “Because you wanted to be alone with me?” Jess asked, hopefully.

  Dev leaned her elbows on her knees. “Of course,” she said. “But also, something I saw in the console was incorrect and I wanted to talk to you about it when the others weren’t listening.”

  Jess sighed.

  “And also, I did not want to import our keys into that system. I will get your communications arranged, and then perhaps we can discuss the incorrectness.”

  “Or we could just kiss each other,” Jess said mournfully. “Because I’ve got a feeling I’m not going to enjoy the communication or your critique of my homestead’s records keeping.” She hoisted herself to her feet and racked her rifle to charge before she came over and dropped onto the jumpseat next to Dev.

  Dev studied her. “It has been a difficult day.”

  “Yeah.” Jess
let her head rest against the pilot’s console. “But this isn’t making it shorter. Spool up the comms.” She sighed again. “Let me get that over with anyway.”

  “Yes.” Dev put her ear cup on and started up the communications board, tuning in the frequencies to the satellite far overhead. She got sync, then sent out their ident. “BR270006 to Base Ten. Requested comm sync.”

  There was a moment’s silence, then she saw the link come up. “Base Ten copy. This is centops. Sec comms request for Agent Drake.”

  “Yes, stand by please.” Dev set it up, then glanced at Jess. “Do you wish this at your station?”

  Jess debated just sitting where she was, then realized she’d need to authenticate with her eyeballs, and reluctantly got up and went back to her chair, settling into it and pulling the comms board toward her. “Gimme a sec.”

  “Please stand by,” Dev repeated into her comms, waiting to transfer the request to Jess when she came live on the board.

  Jess got her comms kit on. “Send it back.” She waited, then adjusted the board as it lit, and the identiscan hit her. She blinked, then forced her eyes still as the pupil analyzer did its work, the screen pausing before resolving into the image of Bensen Alters. “Sir.”

  “Drake.” He glanced around. “Are you alone?”

  “Just me and Dev.”

  He paused and Jess wondered if he was going to ask her to make Dev leave, but then he cleared his throat and went on. “I hear you found the insertion.”

  “They found me,” Jess said. “Though, I don’t think they expected to find me since there were only two of them and they didn’t look like they were figuring on dealing with anything other than my crap ass relatives.”

  He nodded. “They were a lower level team. Intel thinks they were there to interact with someone at the Bay.”

  “Probably my late brother James,” Jess said. “Probably they were delivering something and realized something had gone south, and tried to erase evidence, as in, the rest of my family.”

  Alters studied her. “Do you know what they were delivering?” he asked, after a moment.

  “Seed. Got a cavern full of all kinds of stuff I don’t know the names of but Dev does, since they came from the same place.”

  Both of his eyebrows shot right up. “What?”

  “You should come look. Got no idea where this is going to end. Apparently there’s some kind of glowing rock here in the Bay that lets plants grow.”

  “What?” His voice lifted in both volume and tenor.

  “So they were probably here to collect samples,” Jess said.

  “Because I’m betting no one around here had money to buy that stuff from topside and give it to my feckless sib.”

  “Drake, are you serious?”

  Jess propped her chin on her fist. “Unfortunately, yes. I even ate a...what was that, Dev?”

  “A pea.”

  “A pea,” Jess repeated. “Sorry. Wasn’t expecting to find this here.”

  Alters leaned back in his seat and looked at her, visibly dumbfounded. “All that chaos on the other side with blowing things up and you just have it naturally there?” His voice rose in amazement. “Drake, are you kidding me?”

  Jess grimaced, spreading her hands in a resigned shrug.

  “Holy shit. We’re on our way.” He signed off, and the screen went blank

  Jess exhaled, letting her forehead bang against the console. “Crap.”

  Dev decided she thought Jess needed some hot tea and comfort more than she needed to hear about the incorrectness she’d found. So she quietly assembled a cup and brought it over to her, setting it on the console.

  Jess looked up and studied her, the mist of steam from the tea rising between them. “I didn’t expect to find something world changing here, Dev.”

  “Is that what this is?” Dev perched on the edge of the weapons console. “Because they could grow plants?”

  “Sure. That’s what the other side was trying to do when we blew everyone up.”

  “No, I know...but what if that’s the only place it can happen? There’s something special in the rocks, isn’t there?”

  Jess shook her head. “Have no idea. The research team from the base’ll tell us.” She picked up the cup and sipped from the tea. “Thanks for the drink.”

  “You seemed in discomfort,” Dev said. “And it’s been a long day.”

  “And it’s not over, and we’ve got to go to the council tomorrow,” Jess groused. “If we’re lucky we’ve got an hour to chill before the goons get here.”

  Dev stood up. “Should I prepare the bed area in this vehicle? We could get some rest. I think if you go back to the other space, you won’t get any.”

  Jess thought about all the people back in the family chambers with those dead enemy, and April randomly pointing guns at them, and smiled. “Y’know, that’s not a bad idea, Devvie.” She stood up and ruffled Dev’s hair. “But first off, tell me what you saw in the rig.”

  Dev went and got her scanner and brought it back over. “It was this.” She displayed something on it and turned it around so Jess could see it. “These traces. I think they...” She paused, as Jess grabbed the scanner from her and peered at it. “They appear to be from the other side.”

  “They are,” Jess said. “That was a full data link.”

  “Yes,” Dev said. “I didn’t want to import our keys there.”

  Jess handed back the scanner, then leaned over and gave her a kiss on the lips. “You’re such a rock star. I’ll have the team take that apart when they get here. No telling what they sucked down because of that idiot.”

  Dev smiled in quiet contentment. That had been an excellent result. “I am going to relay that to Doug, so they don’t do anything unfortunate while we are gone.” She took the scanner back to her station and sat down, resuming her ear cup.

  Jess watched her, then picked up her tea and settled back in her console chair, rocking it back and allowing her body to fully relax as she let her head rest against the padded surface. The color had leeched back into her vision, and she felt calm, able to eject the buzz from the fight as she considered the situation they were in.

  So many possible vectors. So many possibilities. She tried to remember if she’d spent any time in that cavern, and found nothing in her memory about it. So was it new? Something they’d found recently?

  And what were those rocks? Jess studied the roof of the carrier. She didn’t remember seeing any glowing rocks growing up there. She’d been in enough underwater caverns to know.

  So where had they come from?

  Unexpectedly, hands touched her shoulders and started a warm, steady kneading pressure, and she looked up to see Dev looking down at her with a gentle smile.

  To hell with it. “Let’s get that bunk set up,” Jess said. “Probably be the only nice thing to happen to me for the rest of the night. “

  Chapter Four

  IT WAS LATE, and they were back in the cavern, this time with a dozen other people in Interforce uniforms, including Bensen Alters.

  Jess was getting tired and bored, having answered the same questions over and over again since the team arrived. It was long after midwatch, and she’d sent April, Doug and Dev to bed, and her family as well now that Interforce security was guarding the halls.

  “Drake,” Alters said. “This is unbelievable.”

  Jess sighed.

  The commander laughed shortly and gave her a slap on the arm. “I mean it. We’re going to take some samples, and send it up to Juneau for them to analyze. I talked to HQ about twenty minutes ago and they’re having a fit.”

  “I bet,” Jess said. “Maybe it’ll encourage legal to get my ass out of here because I’m going to be the biggest target this side of a shrimp harvest once word gets around.” She folded her arms over her chest and frowned.

  “Drake, do you understand what this means?”

  Jess eyed him. “As in, do I get it that there are plants growing here? Sure. What if this is the only
cave on the planet it’ll do this in? So we’ve got a cool cavern. Extra cred when we sell it to the ritzy boys, or finally a decent salad in the mess.”

  Alters pursed his lips and regarded the glowing ceiling of the cave. “Bet some of the lab boys can figure it out,” he said. “Feels a little warm.” He held his hand out. “Maybe I’m imagining it...what did you say you ate in here?”

  Jess steered him over to the peas and plucked one off a stalk, splitting it open as she remembered Dev doing. She presented him with the round balls. “Peas. Dev knew all about ’em.”

  Gingerly, he took one and put it in his mouth, chewing it with a thoughtful expression. “Not bad. So what’s the temp here? Your family up in arms?”

  “With us here? No. Family’s scared shitless. Residents are clapping behind their back. There’s a lot of hardliners here who didn’t much care for Jimmy doing a deal with the other side.”

  Alters took another pea, and strolled along the corridor motioning to her to follow him. When they had progressed to the other end, away from the rest of the busily scanning team, he paused. “We sure that’s what happened?”

  Jess inspected a section where a bushlike plant had round, fuzzy objects on it. “What else would it be?” She reached out and took hold of a large sphere, tugged it off the stem, and brought it to her nose to sniff it.

  “With the attack? We know they’re involved.” Alters watched her with interest. “But are they the instigators, or did they just hear about it and do what we’d have done?”

  Finding the scent sort of nice, she bit into it, surprised to find it juicy and sweet inside. “Oh.” She licked her lips and reached out without looking, pulled off another one and handed it to him. “Better than those peas.”

  Agreeably, he took it and bit into it.

  “I’m wondering myself. I just can’t make myself believe Jimmy solicited them,” Jess admitted. “Even before the shares transitioned, he knew better.”

  “Huh.” He examined the sphere. “That’s good.” He looked around. “People here we already talked to were pissed off because they humped a lot getting this place setup, then didn’t get any of the results.”