A Star Reborn: A Space Opera Adventure (Seven Stars Saga Book 2)

by AJ Super

  “Captain?” Sarama’s lilting voice echoed across her comm.

  Nyx pulled her helmet off and sniffed. “I’m on my way.”

  16

  Nyx’s hands were manacled in front of her as she trudged down the dark, narrow hall divided by floor-to-ceiling rusted metal lattice. She kept her head low and her eyes moving. Malcam followed her, his steps guarded. She glanced over her shoulder to Yoon and Matthews, a study in opposites. Matthews sashayed with a smile, relaxed and curious, while Yoon’s body tensed at every click and ping of the new environment around him. The four extra crew behind Yoon had volunteered for the op and stood still, as if mesmerized by the sight of Nyx. Hairs standing on the back of her neck, she turned back. In front of her, Sarama brushed the arm of her black uniform and walked easily by the side of the foreman whose clothes didn’t have a speck of mining dust on them. Behind the line of prisoners, Red had a pulse rifle slung over her shoulder, and she chatted quietly with a guard dressed in steel grey and black body-armor. So far, getting into Yangxi X didn’t seem like it was going to be hard.

  “Mutiny, eh?” The foreman smirked. “But no one has the couilles to kill them?”

  “That’s why we’re sending them here, monsieur.” Sarama smiled grimly at the shaggy-haired man whose thick accent placed him from somewhere in the Latin American Continental Federation. “Yangxi X has a reputation for… needing workers. Even though they get the same number as the rest of the asteroid mines.”

  The foreman snorted. “Mining’s more dangerous here.”

  Sarama nodded, her black curls bobbing around her cheeks. “Much more. It would be good if that danger were to eliminate our problem, mon ami. Especially these.” She motioned to the four at the head of the line.

  The foreman pouted and stopped, the way barred by a series of locked doors. “They trouble? I’m sure they can find some here.” He put a hand on Sarama’s shoulder, and Nyx tensed, her body ready to spring. “Problem is…” His hand fluttered up to a loose curl, and he pushed it behind her ear. “That man,” he said, motioning to Yoon, “is familiar to me.”

  Sarama froze for a moment then shrugged. “He’s still a mutineer, and I want him gone. Don’t care how you know him, or how you do it. As long as he’s not on my ship, you can make him your queen for all I care.”

  He fiddled with her curl and then dropped his hand, pushing out his lower lip. “Fine. Fine. We’ll take him. He’ll be an honored guest.”

  Sarama smiled sweetly and twined her fingers into his. “Thank you. Now, I have a ship to tend to. Things to right. Maintenance to be done. Loyalists to uncover. The usual.”

  A chill went through Nyx’s limbs. If she didn’t know better, she would think Sarama was actually staging a mutiny to take over the Thanatos. But, no. This was a part of the plan—their cover for being sold to the mine in such a small group.

  “They’ll be taken care of, Captain.” The man licked his lips then put an arm out. A guard on the opposite side of the center metal lattice rattled a door next to Sarama and unlocked it, swinging it towards him. Sarama nodded to the foreman and waved to Red as she pivoted towards the door with the corner of her mouth turned up. She glanced sideways at Nyx with a raised brow.

  Nyx bobbed her head lightly. Everything was going well so far. Sarama was walking out of the asteroid mine with Red in tow. Metallic clanks echoed down the hallway as doors were shut and locked behind them. The manacles on Nyx’s wrists rested heavy on her thighs. She bowed her head, watching the tips of her boots.

  The foreman cleared his throat. “Where’ll we be puttin’ you? You’re pretty, but not pretty enough for Isabeau’s harem…” He put a finger under her chin and forced her head up, leaning in closely. “You’re too small for the ring. You wouldn’t last a second.”

  Nyx balked. Malcam, because of his sheer size, would automatically get sent to the ring. The plan was to get sent there with him, so she had protection. Not that she needed protection. It was one of the compromises she had made so that they would let her play God on this operation. Yoon would allow himself to be sent directly to the mines with Matthews and the rest of the group… But the Greene siblings didn’t think they’d take more than two directly from the group to the ring, even with prompting from Sarama.

  So, if the foreman wasn’t going to take her, Yoon would go to the ring. She couldn’t let that happen. She leaned closer to the greasy-faced man. He sneered.

  She smiled, her eyes bright. Then, she clamped her teeth over his nose, peeling her lips away from his greased flesh, and bit down hard. Blood blossomed in a fountain into her mouth and drained down her chin. The foreman squealed and wheeled his arms backwards, pushing at Nyx’s shoulders.

  She released the man’s nose and swung her manacles across his jaw with a loud crack. His head snapped to the side, and he stumbled against the oxide-streaked wall.

  A hard object lodged in the base of Nyx’s spine as she stepped forward, lifting her leg to kick the foreman in his gut as he struggled to right himself. She froze and looked behind her. The guard in black and silver body armor held an extended electrical prod and grinned gleefully.

  Nyx’s eyes widened. Electricity passed through her tensed muscles, jerking her head back and slamming her jaw shut on her tongue. She convulsed. Her fingers tightened and toes curled, the smell of copper and blood permeating through her nasal passages.

  The guard pulled the prod from the center of her back, and Nyx toppled into Malcam. Her eyes fluttered, and she fought to stay conscious, her breath uneven.

  “Put the salope in the ring,” the foreman mumbled with his hand over his bloody face. “I don’t care if she doesn’t last. She can just die there.” He spat at her feet. “The big guy with her too… And the pretty one behind her, the one who’s been here before. He can go to the harem. I think Isabeau’s last body-servant was summarily dismissed, and they need a replacement.”

  Nyx tried to stand, but Malcam wrapped his shackled hands around her upper arm and shook his head.

  Yoon nodded to her. “I’ll be fine,” he whispered.

  A big guard, his electrical prod drawn, appeared straight ahead, behind one of the locked doors. The foreman unlocked the door, and the guard standing by Malcam tapped Nyx’s shoulder and pointed to the open door with his prod. Malcam started forward, Nyx stumbling in front of him.

  “It’s nice to know that someone cares for her,” the foreman whispered as Malcam and Nyx passed him. “At least that’ll make an interesting fight.”

  Nyx’s breath came in fits and starts. When they took this place, he’d die slowly, painfully. She’d make sure.

  Malcam pushed her forward, through the open gate, and down the dim corridor.

  The big guard followed them, electrical prod slapping against his thigh as he stepped heavily. Nyx could barely stand and leaned into Malcam’s wide chest. Her muscles still jumped with electricity, but she could feel control slowly returning as her nanos corrected the imbalance in her system. Her stiff limbs softened, and her heartrate stabilized. She breathed more regularly.

  They reached another grouping of gated doorways and another large, body-armored guard stood on the opposite side of one on the far right. Even in Nyx’s groggy state, she was grateful for the map the Greene siblings had given the team. This asteroid was a spiderweb of rusted and locked doors and branching corridors—a mine turned prison, with so many twists and turns that there was no way they would get out without their guidance.

  The first guard walked in front of Malcam and Nyx with an easy step. “How do, Warden?” he said with a snicker and leaned on the gate.

  The second big guard behind the gate grunted. “She’s a little small for down here. And she’s listing… Something wrong with her?”

  The guard leaning on the gate looked over his shoulder at Malcam as he held Nyx up. “Pissed off that branleur foreman, so she must have a little spunk.” He pulled a magnetic key from his pocket and swiped it over the door, unlocking it.

  “Spun
k doesn’t win fights,” the Warden grumbled and pushed the door open.

  “I don’t know.” The first big guard smiled at Nyx. “She made him bleed awful good. Was about to take him down a notch when Otis zapped her. I may make a killing on the odds on her.”

  The Warden motioned a stone-faced Malcam through the gate. Nyx pushed off Malcam’s chest and walked forward with a shackled hand to her woozy head.

  The Warden swung the door shut behind them. “You say she got zapped? Couldn’ta been for long. She’s still walking,” he whispered to the big guard through the closed gate.

  “That’s the thing.” The first guard leaned towards the rusty lattice dividing the two hallways. “Otis laid into her good. More’n five seconds. Woulda melted me. And she’s still up and walking.”

  The Warden whistled low. “Wonder who she is?”

  The big guard straightened. “Someone no one wants around, apparently.”

  “Then this is the place to be.” The Warden chuckled.

  Malcam cleared his throat, and the guards nodded to each other and tapped their hearts. The first guard traipsed back up through the corridor they just came, and the Warden turned to the two prisoners.

  “I’m known as the Warden in this sector.” He crossed his arms over his silver and black body armor. “If you win, if you live, I can get you what you want. If you don’t, I find a nice place to dump your body to rot.” He slipped past Malcam and glanced at Nyx. “I don’t abide fighting, except in the ring. All grudges are to be settled in the ring. Do you understand? The ring is all.”

  Malcam nodded.

  Nyx held a hand to her head. “The ring is all,” she whispered.

  “Good. Now that you understand, let’s get you some quarters.”

  Malcam narrowed his eyes. “Quarters?”

  The Warden smirked. “Follow me.” He swept past the two and thumped down the hallway.

  “You doing okay?” Malcam whispered, fingers resting lightly on the small of Nyx’s back.

  She nodded and moaned. She could be doing better. Things still sounded like they were filtered out of a fishbowl, and the world wobbled, but she could breathe, and her body was looser. She was going to kill the foreman and the guard called Otis. Her gut burned, and she swallowed a mouthful of bile. Good thing she hadn’t had much of an appetite before the op.

  The Warden glanced behind him to make sure they were following in the dusky passage. There was a hard left ahead, Nyx remembered, then there would be a single door into the ring cells.

  “We can do it now, or later,” Malcam mumbled.

  “Later,” Nyx shot over her shoulder. “Let’s see what kind of allies we can find first. Who we can convert to the Cult of Nyx.”

  “It’ll be harder later.”

  Nyx nodded imperceptibly.

  The Warden opened the magnetically locked door at the end of the bend and walked through, ushering the two prisoners through behind him, so he could shut and lock the hallway door again. His eyes sparkled. “Please continue two doors down and to the right. You’ll be sharing for the night.”

  Malcam and Nyx trudged to the door the Warden had indicated and stopped short. The three-meter square cell had a wash basin and a toilet to one side and a dingy grey blanket and mattress folded in the upper corner. The bars on the door flaked rust.

  “Nice quarters,” Malcam growled.

  The Warden slid past Malcam’s hulk and pressed his magnetic key against the door to open it. “You didn’t seriously think you’d be getting anything nicer than a barred cell?”

  Nyx walked into the cell and kicked the bedding. A puff of black dust flew into the air.

  “Sorry, our cleaning staff has been off duty since forever.” The Warden smirked. “You won’t mind, though. One of you will be dead tomorrow. And judging by this monster’s size, it’ll be you, little lady.”

  Nyx bobbed her head and smiled. “We’ll see.”

  The Warden patted Malcam’s back as he walked in the cell. “Turn.” He waved a magnetic key for the cuffs. Nyx stepped forward and held out her hands. Then Malcam held his up, and Nyx walked to the back of the cell, free of her shackles. “Remember to play nice,” the Warden whispered. “You seem to like her, so I imagine you’ll want to protect her tomorrow. You’ll see why that’s a bad idea.” He pursed his lips. “Say your goodbyes tonight.” He shut the door behind them and disappeared down the dim corridor.

  Nyx kicked the mattress out flat and plopped down on it with her knees high. “I guess this is it. No backing out now.”

  Malcam sat next to her and leaned against the rust-dripped wall. “The ring is all?” he snorted.

  She shrugged. “It’s what he wanted to hear.”

  “You sounded like…”

  “One of my followers?”

  Malcam looked at his hands. “Yeah.”

  “Tell me this won’t backfire. Tell me this is a good idea.”

  “You need the bodies. In a war, you need cannon fodder.”

  Nyx sucked in her breath. “I don’t want to think of them that way.”

  “You’ll have to. In order to send them into a battle, you’ll have to.” Malcam turned and stared at her, his cerulean eyes tracing deep into hers.

  She looked away.

  “That shock probably fried some of your nanos… you should rest,” he said softly.

  Nyx leaned her head onto Malcam’s shoulder. “Rest with me. I doubt anyone will do anything to us until tomorrow.”

  He wrapped an arm around her waist and scooted her forward, laying down with her on the dirty mattress. “Whatever you want, princess.” He nestled his face in her sable hair, and she closed her eyes.

  She mumbled, “This has to work,” but she doubted Malcam understood her as her breath evened. He just kissed the back of her head gently and pulled her closer.

  17

  Malcam shook Nyx awake. Her head pounded. Strange. Some of her nanomedics must have really been fried. She hadn’t felt pain like this for a while. That putain de bâton paralysant had a kick. But at least after some sleep she could think straight. She put a hand to her temple as she sat up.

  A black opening gaped in front of her, and she shook her head, confused. The back wall had slid away, revealing a dark, rusted passage.

  “It just opened,” Malcam said softly and stood, holding out a hand.

  “We’re supposed to go down there?”

  “It’s probably our invitation to the ring.”

  Nyx nodded and grabbed Malcam’s wrist, pulling herself up. “Even if it’s not, it’s what we’re here for, right? Figuring out how to take over from the inside… We shouldn’t disappoint whoever sent the invitation.”

  Malcam drew his lips into a thin line. Nyx kicked at the dirty blanket twining around her feet and walked over the top of the dusty mattress to the gaping hole in the cell.

  This wasn’t what the Greene siblings had given her in their report. They were supposed to be escorted to an open ring surrounded by wire mesh right from the beginning. So, who was giving them this strange escape route? Was it even an escape route? Her heart raced as she extended her fingers and ran her hand along the rough rock wall to guide herself in the dim. Malcam followed close behind. The door slid shut once he stepped into the narrow, arched passage, cutting off what little light they had.

  “Putain. It’s dark,” he whispered, as if he were going to disturb the silent darkness around them. His radiant blue waves burned around her, and she let her white wisps dance amid the rise and fall, ebbing and flowing together in the black of the asteroid. It may not have illuminated the corridor, but it was still a comfort to have him so close and visible to her.

  The rock under Nyx’s fingers was cool and dry, crumbling lightly as her hand passed over it. A light blossomed in front of them, and she stepped gingerly forward.

  The two emerged into a wide cave with a clear glass cube centered in the red-walled mine. Circling the chamber, a translucent gallery jutted from the rock, glowing with the s
hadows of spectators. The glass cube shone brightly against the black-shot red rock.

  Nyx balked. The ring. It looked like it had an immense upgrade since the Greene siblings had escaped. It was much more secure. No guards to prevail upon. Just a slick, glass-sided cube with three glass cubes off to the side. The ring was a closed system with its own air cyclers even.

  Above in a tinted gallery, Nyx could see the shadows of people presumably waiting for the next match.

  A snicker let out behind them. “It’s never what people expect.” The Warden walked forward, peeling out of a shadow near the wall, the guard called Otis looming beside him.

  Nyx tensed.

  Malcam put a hand on her shoulder.

  “Do you like it? It’s less of a ring now, more of an enclosure. But we like the—” He snickered again. “Ring of ring.”

  Nyx glared at him. “Who are the people watching?”

  “Oh, them? Various donors from the colonies, Earth, wherever.” The Warden flipped a hand. “Very rich patrons who made this upgrade possible.”

  There was no way she was going to be able to flaunt her powers here… There were no other fighters. No other prisoners. No guards. Just a bunch of people hiding behind smoky glass. She needed to get into the gallery and do something with the people behind all this nonsense. Only then would the miners be completely free. Only then would she be able to truly win their loyalty… If those who oppressed them and tortured them were taken care of somehow, maybe the miners would see it as a revenge completed. Nyx flexed her fists. She would have to kill them. Wouldn’t she? How many people were up there? How many people were privy to this torture? Gleefully watched as prisoners killed each other? She was going to need a lot of blood to do this, and she was unarmed. She glanced at Malcam. He was going to have to kill her, and he wasn’t going to like it.

  The Warden frowned, then nodded to Otis, who raised his electrical prod and approached Nyx and Malcam. Nyx put her hands ups, and Malcam stepped away from her, hands held from his body. The Warden walked to the side of the larger cube. Nyx’s gaze trailed after him, and she scanned the cavern again. To the right of the cube, in a dark recess, hid a small single-person lift, where the Warden met with the foreman. The foreman got on the lift, palmed a pad on the wall and ascended to the gallery above.