My newest assailant, unfortunately, was already forewarned.
“Let’s not cause any more trouble, okay?” My voice sounded thin in the encroaching darkness. I wondered what had happened to that ‘tone of command’ Fleet regs had insisted we adopt. It had obviously taken one look at the harsh prison world of Moabar and decided it preferred to reside elsewhere. I didn’t blame it. I only wished I had the same choice.
I drew a deep breath. “If I’m on your grid, I’m leaving. Wasn’t my intention to be here,” I added, feeling that was probably the understatement of the century. “And if he,” I said with a nod to the large body sprawled to my right, “was your partner, then I’m sorry. But I wasn’t in the mood.”
A brittle snap started my heart pounding again. My hand felt as slick against the smooth metal of the dagger as if the Taka’s blood still ran down its surface. The sound was on my right, beyond where the Taka lay. Only a fool would try to take me over the lifeless barrier at my feet. A fool, or someone not intent on harming me. At least, not right away.
The first of Moabar’s three moons had risen in the hazy night sky. I glimpsed a flicker of movement, then saw him step out of the shadows just as the clouds cleared away from the moon. His face was hidden, distorted. But I clearly saw the distinct shape of a short-barreled rifle propped against his shoulder. That, and the fact that he appeared humanoid, told me he wasn’t a prison guard. Energy weapons were banned on Moabar. Most of the eight-foot-tall Takas didn’t need them, anyway.
The man before me was tall, but not eight feet. Nor did his dark jacket glisten with official prison insignia. Another con, then. Possession of the rifle meant he had off-world sources, and probably wielded some power among the other convicts as well.
I took a step back as he approached. His pace was casual, as if he were just taking his gun out for a moonlit stroll. He prodded the dead guard with the tip of the rifle then squatted down, ran one hand over the guard’s work vest as if checking for a weapon, or perhaps life signs. I could have told him the guard had neither. “Perhaps I should’ve warned him about you,” he said, rising. “Captain Chasidah Bergren. Pride of the Sixth Fleet. One dangerous woman. But, oh, I forgot. You’re not a captain anymore.”
With a chill I recognized the mocking tone, the cultured voice. And suddenly the dead guard and the rifle were the least of my problems. I breathed a name in disbelief. “Sullivan! This is impossible. You’re dead—”
“Well, if I’m dead, then so are you.” His mirthless laugh was as soft as footsteps on a grave. “Welcome to Hell, Captain. Welcome to Hell.”
We found two fallen trees, hunkered down and stared at each other, each waiting for the other to make a move. It was just like old times. Except there was the harsh glow of his lightbar between us, not the blackness of space.
“I never pegged you for an easy kill,” I told him. Which was true. The reports of his death two years ago had actually surprised me more than his reappearance just now. I balanced the dagger in my hand, not yet content to let it wrap itself around my wrist. “When I heard what happened at Garno it sounded too easy. I didn’t buy it.” I shrugged and pushed aside what else I’d thought, and felt, when I’d heard the news. My opinions and feelings about the death of a known mercenary and smuggler mattered little anymore.
He seemed to hear my unspoken comment. “It wasn’t planned to fool anyone with a modicum of intelligence. Only the government. And, of course, their news-hounds. But tell me the news of my passing pained you,” he continued, dropping his voice to a well-remembered low rumble, “and I’ll do my best to assuage your fears.”
A muted boom sounded in the distance, rattling through the forest. Another shuttle arriving, breaking the sound barrier on descent. He turned toward it, so I was spared answering what I knew to be a jibe. Regardless, I had no intention of telling him about my pain.
Patches of light and shadow moved over his face. Sullivan’s profile had always been strong, aristocratic, dominating the Imperial police bulletins and Fleet patrol advisories. He had his father’s lean jawline, his mother’s thick dark hair. Both were more than famous in their own right, but not for the same reasons as Sully. They were members of the Empire’s elite; he was simply elusive.
The lightbar reached full power. It was almost like shiplight, crisp and clear. He turned back to me, his lips curved in a wry smile, as if he knew I’d been studying him.
He’d aged since I last saw him, about six months before his highly publicized demise. The thick, short-cropped black hair was sprinkled with silver. The dark eyes had more lines at the corners. The mouth still claimed its share of arrogance, though—as if he knew he’d always be one handsome bastard.
However, something else had changed, something deeper inside him. It was nothing I could see, sitting there under the canopy of the forest. It was something I knew. Because I was sitting there with Gabriel Ross Sullivan and I was still alive.
All the more reason to ignore his attempt at taunting me. His existence had been far more troublesome to me than his purported passing. “What went down on Garno? You cut a deal?” Moabar or death had been offered to a lot of people, but not to me. Most chose death. I hadn’t had that luxury.
He snorted. It was a disdainful sound I remembered well. He shoved the rifle almost to my nose. “What’s this look like? How long have you been here, three weeks?”
I knew what it was. Illegal. Damn difficult to come by. A rifle didn’t wrap around your wrist like my dagger, or fit in the sole of a boot.
A thought chilled me. Maybe the Taka weren’t the only guards the prison authorities used.
“Yeah, three weeks, two days, and seventeen hours. You know what they say about how time flies.” I held his gaze evenly. His eyes were dark, like pieces of obsidian, unreadable. “That’s a Norlack 473 rifle. Sniper model. Modified, it appears, to handle illegal wide-load slash charges.”
He laughed. “On point as ever, Bergren. Dedicated captain of a peashooter squad out in no man’s land. Keeping those freighters safe from dangerous pirates like me. And even when they damn you and ship you here and every inch of you still belongs to Fleet Ops.” He shook his head. “Your mama wore army boots, and so do you.”
“What do you want, Sully?” I jerked my chin toward the dead Taka. “You cleaning up after him? Or finishing what he didn’t?”
He turned the rifle in his hands. “This isn’t Fleet issue. Or prison stock. This is mine. Contraband, wasn’t that how your orders phrased it? Stolen. Modified.” He paused and pinned me intently with his obsidian gaze.
We’d had conversations like this before, most often with me on the bridge of my small patrol ship. He’d be on the bridge of the Boru Karn, his pilot and bridge crew flickering in and out of the shadows behind him. He rarely answered anything directly. He threw words at you, phrases, like hints to a puzzle he’d taunt you to solve. Or like free-form poetry, the kind that always sounded better after a few beers. He loved to play with words.
I didn’t. “Okay. So no deal was cut and you’re not working for the Ministry of Corrections. Don’t tell me you’ve added Moabar to your vacation plans?”
He laughed again, more easily this time. But not easily enough for me to put my dagger back around my wrist.
“A resort for the suicidal but faint at heart? Don’t bother to slit your own throat, we’ll do it for you.” He gestured theatrically. “It could work. If I couldn’t market it, hell, no one could.”
“Not a lot of repeat business.”
“Ah, but that is the operative word. Business.”
“Is it? What are you funding here, prison breaks?” If he wasn’t with the M.O.C., then he had to be working against them. But I’d never heard of any successful escapes from Moabar. There was no prison, per se. No formal structure. Just an inhospitable, barely habitable world of long frigid winters that brought airborne viruses, and bleak, chilled summers. Like now. I was lucky my sentence started when it did. I’d have time to acclimate. Others, dumped
dirtside in the midst of a blizzard, often died within hours.
“If I’m funding anything, it’s freedom for a cause. I’ve found, since my untimely but useful demise, that this place can provide me with a source of cheap, willing labor.”
“Willing being the operative word, I take it?”
“Willing being the operative word, yes.”
“Doing what?” I knew many of Sully’s operations before Garno: stolen cargo, weapons, illegal drugs, ships, and everything that fell in-between. I just couldn’t see why he’d chosen to seek me out. My expertise lay in none of those areas. Unless he’d lost his pilot, needed someone to captain a ship for him. But why come to me? He could have his pick from those who lined the barstools in any spaceport pub.
But then, I’d ignored his all-important earlier comment: my mother wore army boots.
“You know the system,” he told me. “You were born and raised in it. As were your parents, and your parents’ parents. I know your personnel file, Captain Chasidah ‘Chaz’ Bergren. Daughter of Engineering Specialist Amaris Deirdre Bergren and Lt. Commander Lars Bergren. Sister of Commander Thaddeus Bergren, currently second in command at the Marker Shipyards. Granddaughter of Lieutenant—”
“I know who I am.”
“So do I.”
“Good. Then you know my mother’s been dead for almost twenty years and I haven’t spoken to my father in over ten. And my brother, since the trial, won’t permit my name to be mentioned within earshot. What’s the point?”
“The point, my lovely angel—and no, don’t look so skeptical. Though I may be a veritable walking list of negative personality traits, the one thing I am not, and never have been, is a liar. It’s my great downfall, Chaz. So if I say you’re lovely—” He reached as if to touch my chin with his fingertips. I jerked back and almost fell off my log. I dragged my boot heel in the dirt to keep my balance.
“Don’t tumble for me yet, darlin’.” He laughed. “We have business to attend to first. As I was saying, death has afforded me a new perspective. A new maturity, if you will. While my goals haven’t changed, my methodology has. That’s where you come in.”
“A mere captain of a pea shooter squadron?”
“That’s Fleet’s appraisal of your talents. Not mine.”
“No, you always called me an interfering bitch.”
“If you must quote me, please be accurate. A beautiful, interfering bitch. And now that I find I’m in need of one particular beautiful, interfering bitch, I can’t think of one better. So tell me, my angel, are you ready to leave this veritable paradise and make a pact with the ghost from Hell?”
I turned the dagger in my hand, watched the light play over the blade. I’d been willing to sell my soul earlier for a nightscope and a laser pistol. On Moabar, that would guarantee survival. But Sully was offering me more. He was offering me a way off Moabar. Freedom. On Hell’s terms, but freedom nonetheless.
I nodded, stuck my hand out. “Officer’s agreement.”
He clasped my hand firmly, then went down on one knee and brought it to his lips.
I pulled my fingers away from his mouth, angry at the invisible firemoths that seemed to dance across my skin at his touch. “This is a business deal, Sullivan.”
He sat back on his heel, grinning. “Whatever you say.”
“Damn straight.” I pushed myself to my feet, transferred the dagger to my right hand and started to let it wrap around my left wrist. Then stopped. He’d retrieved the rifle and now stood towering over me, his dark eyes glinting brightly from the lightbar in his hand.
I let my fingers close around the hilt of the dagger, kept it between us as I followed him into the forest. Maybe I’d hold onto it this way, for a while. Just in case my ghost’s good humor dissolved like mist from the moons.
Sully tabbed the lightbar down to half-power, just enough to guide us over fallen logs and rock-filled ditches. He held it low, our bodies blocking its telltale glow. I lengthened my strides to match his.
The only sounds were our footsteps crunching against the carpet of brittle twigs, the occasional slap of a branch against our jackets. His, like mine, was black, spacer-issue plain.
We slipped like shadows between the shaggy trees. It was as if I were twenty-two years old again, back in basic training, on a dirtside recon exercise. Sully moved that way too, with a cautious grace. A bright patch of moonlight cascaded through an opening in the forest canopy. As one, we edged around it.
I caught a wry, half-smile on his face. He angled his mouth down to my ear, echoing my thoughts. “Feels like boot camp.”
I hated boot camp. But it had taught me some invaluable lessons. Apparently, Sully had learned them as well—though I couldn’t remember any stint in the military on his dossier. I was about to ask where he’d trained when something glinted ahead of us, far off to the right.
Instinctively I flattened against a tree. My fingers tightened on the dagger. The lightbar blinked out as my heart rate picked up. Then my face was in Sully’s chest as he clasped me protectively. I flinched back involuntarily, surprised not only by his action, but by a rush of heat. Then it was gone and I tagged it as nothing more than adrenaline fighting against a severe lack of sleep. He pushed me to my knees, crouched down with me. He flicked the safety off the rifle, angled it up.
His left hand cupped the back of my head, drew my face against his shoulder again. “Damned redhead,” he whispered. “You glow like a jumpgate beacon. Now, hush. Be still for a moment.”
A rush of wind rattled the leaves around us. I ducked my head further down, even though I knew my hair wasn’t that red. It was dark auburn and, after three weeks on Moabar, far from glowing. I doubted the color was Sully’s real reason, anyway. I didn’t know if there was something out there he didn’t want me to see, or he was simply feeding his ego by playing hero. Either way, I wasn’t about to argue. My strange lightheadedness had returned. I needed a moment to steady myself, find focus.
His breathing was deep and even. He turned away from me, his gaze locked on something on the right. As I was hunkered down between him and the large tree, I could only see the outline of his hand on the rifle and the dark, skewed shadows of the forest floor.
“What is it?” I asked as quietly as I could. His fingers threaded into my braid as if he wanted to unravel it. Or, I realized with a blinding flash of stupidity, as if he searched for a way to get a strong and painful grip on me.
I remembered what had been on that Takan guard’s agenda and tried to jerk my head back. Then I heard it.
A wheezing noise. A crackling. The sound that tissue paper would make if it were composed of glass. And another rush of wind, air pushing past me.
My mouth suddenly went dry.
Sully shifted his weight, brought the rifle up to eye level. The faint greenish glow of the nightscope reflected back on his face.
The crackling stopped.
I smelled something foul. My stomach clenched in response. A jukor. A vicious, fanged mutant beast with the distinctive scent of rotting garbage. A breeding experiment by the M.O.C., jukors were a distorted, hideous version of ancient, imaginary soul-stealers. They’d been bred to combat the more current, very real telepathic Stolorth Ragkirils. The government halted the jukor experiment ten years ago, when it had become apparent the creatures couldn’t be controlled. Not like Takas.
I knew the smell because I’d had escort duty with a ship hauling a pack of jukors to be destroyed. It was a smell I’d never forget.
It was one I knew I shouldn’t be remembering now.
A long wheeze, closer. My heart thudded at the sound. It was scenting for something. Us, most likely. Or its mate. Either option was a bad one. If it chose us as prey, its powerful hind legs and winged upper forearms would make it damn near impossible to evade.
If it were scenting for a mate, it would kill any other creature in its path in its lust.
A frightening thought. If it were scenting for a mate, that meant jukors were alive, br
eeding again, for M.O.C. purposes. Perhaps even new and improved?
Either way, we were dead unless Sully killed it first. My dagger would barely be able to pierce its hide.
Fingers tugged at my scalp. He was unraveling my braid. I mentally questioned my ghost’s sanity and jerked my head away, frowning.
He yanked it back. His breath was hot against my ear. “Your hair wrap. I need it. Now.”
I swore silently, slapped the dagger back around my wrist then as quickly, and as quietly, as possible, unraveled the leather and fabric laces. My hair fell almost to my waist, drifting over my arms as I shoved the cords into his outstretched hand. My mind still questioned his sanity.
He thrust the rifle at me. “Keep a lock on it.”
As I brought the nightscope to my eye I caught a glimpse of Sully grabbing a stout, broken tree limb from the ground.
Two moons dotted the night sky, adding their light. The jagged form of the jukor almost jumped through the eyepiece at me. It was twenty-five feet from us. Upwind. Its long snout moved slowly side to side. I heard the crackling again as it flexed one wing. Barbed tips, like tiny razors, glinted sharp and cruel.
Its lower arms and legs were furred A hide formed of rock-hard scales covered its chest and back. Only the base of its throat was vulnerable. A soft spot, unprotected.
Damned small.
I moved the rifle slightly as it moved its head.
Sully’s hand covered mine, traded rifle for a leather and fabric-wrapped tree branch.
“It will see it, scent it.” He put the eyepiece to his eye again, the greenish glow like a small alien moon on his face.
I understood. The leather and fabric held my scent.
“Beer toss,” he said.
I understood that, too. Wasn’t a station brat in civilized space who didn’t. Old pub game.
“On three.” He adjusted his balance slightly. He’d have to move the moment the jukor sprang.
“One.” The word was a soft rustle of leaves.
I rose slowly, becoming part of the tree on my left.
“Two.”
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