Aubrey blinked his blind eyes. Skeldhi space? That species had a particular hate for humans. A smile stretched his mouth. He didn’t have one drop of code to get into 16
Morgan Hawke
their craft. He didn’t have their coding language. He wouldn’t be killing any ships today.
“What in bleeding fury are we doing in Skeldhi space?”
Aubrey released a chuckle. “Getting your asses blown away, I’d say.”
“Who the hell gave clearance to pull that kid from his tank?” The voice bellowed right in front of them.
Both men at Aubrey’s elbows released him.
“Captain! Uh, it came from medical, sir!”
Aubrey frowned. That captain sounded nothing like Moribund.
“Yes, sir, Captain, sir! We got notification to pull him, clean him, get him dressed, then take him to”—there was a pause—“dock port seventy-nine, sir!”
“That’s a shuttle bay. Why the hell would someone send him there?”
A strong vibration shook the deck.
Aubrey fell to his knees and laughed. Because someone wanted him to live at all costs. The only person who had known that there was no way in hell he could tap a Skeldhi ship.
Niobe.
He groaned. Bleeding Fate… What were they doing in Skeldhi space? Committing suicide. Niobe must have finally had enough ship-killings and decided to take herself out of the game.
“Son of a fucking bitch!” The captain’s shout came from dead ahead. “Give me the damned kid. You two get to battle stations!”
Aubrey felt his upper arm grabbed by a hand that had serious power in it. He was dragged to his feet and winced.
“Come on.”
Aubrey went. There was no way he could fight the strength in that hand. It would only get his arm broken. “I can’t tap a Skeldhi craft. I don’t have the programs.”
“I know. The nav-pilot already told me.”
Aubrey’s brows shot up. “Then where are we going?”
“To your escape shuttle. Moribund will fry my ass if his most prized possession gets lost.”
Aubrey licked his lips. “This would be a hell of a lot easier for both of us if I could see.”
“Shit.” The captain came to a halt. “Turn around.”
Aubrey turned around. Something was jammed into his data port on the back of his skull, then yanked back out. The darkness brightened.
“Come on.” The hand on Aubrey’s arm jerked him back around and started hauling him down the hallway.
Interstellar Service & Discipline: Lost Star
17
Aubrey squinted. “My sight is still off-line.”
“It’ll get better. Your sight has been off-line awhile.”
Aubrey clenched his jaw. “How long a while?”
The captain snorted. “Long enough to make you nothing but a scrawny bag of bones. I’m afraid if I sneeze too hard, I’ll break you.”
Aubrey was jerked to a halt. The hiss of an opening lift door came from right in front. Bodies moved past them. The captain pushed him into the lift.
Aubrey let himself be jerked around to face the front. “Captain, how long a while have I been playing executable program floating in a liquid tank?”
The captain sighed. “Kid, you really, really don’t want to know the answer to that one.”
Aubrey clenched his jaw. “The men said nine cycles.”
The captain chuckled. “It’s been a little longer than that.”
“How long?”
The lift doors opened. Smoke drifted into the lift with the sounds of screaming metal and shouting men.
Aubrey was shoved forward and angled to the left. His eyes watered in the acidic air.
The captain leaned down to talk in his ear. “Just so you know, most of the docks have already been holed. I don’t know how anyone knew to pull you from the tank and send you here, but this dock holds the one hidden shuttle on this ship. The first officer doesn’t even know about it.”
Aubrey choked. “You’re abandoning your first officer?”
“Fuck yeah. It’s a two-man craft. I’m taking the only thing Moribund wants to keep… You.”
Aubrey shivered. “What the hell kind of people are you? Killing whole crews, even your own?”
“We’re mercenaries.”
Aubrey scowled. “That’s crap! My dad was a merc, and his company didn’t do shit like that!”
The captain tugged Aubrey to a halt. “Yeah, well, he didn’t work for the Moribund Company, did he?”
Aubrey’s eyes saw a colored blur right in front of him. He heard a door open. A hand at his back shoved him up some steps and through a door.
The captain followed right on his heels and grabbed his collar. “You know what Moribund means, don’t you?”
Aubrey grabbed for the hand at his collar. “No, I don’t.” He was propelled forward.
The captain chuckled. “It’s an old Terran term for a dead or abandoned house.”
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Aubrey banged his shin on what he suspected was a chair. He hissed.
“Appropriate since that’s what you guys do, kill everybody on the ships to empty them.”
“Pretty much.” The captain shoved him into a chair. “Hold still.” His hands closed around Aubrey’s throat and squeezed.
Aubrey gasped and grabbed for his wrists.
The captain released him. “Relax, it’s just a collar.”
“What?” Aubrey grabbed for his throat and felt a metal ring around it. “What the fuck…?” The ring went all the way around. He couldn’t find a seam or an opening of any kind.
“Like I said, we can’t afford to lose you. You’ve tripled our take since we jacked you in.” The captain stepped away and a chair creaked to Aubrey’s left. “Buckle in. This is going to be a bumpy ride.”
Aubrey fastened the seat harness over him out of sheer reflex. “What the fuck did you put on me?”
“Oh, that’s an old-style penal collar. It has a homing beacon in it. This way if we crash and you slip out of my hands, the ground party can find you anywhere on the planet.”
“Wait a minute, we’re over a planet?”
“Yep, but not much of one. The air’s a little corrosive, and you have bad lungs, so I’d stay on the ship if I were you.”
The craft jerked hard under them.
“And we’re away.” The captain sighed. “Good-bye, Interceptor, hello, raise.”
Aubrey frowned. “Interceptor?”
“Oh, you didn’t know? That’s the ship’s name.”
“I thought it was Niobe?”
“That was its name when we got it. Sweet craft, but a little unstable in places.”
“Compared to what? Your nav-pilot is completely insane!”
“Yeah, well, for a twisted little fuck, she could pull off miracles, and that’s all that counted. We lost the occasional subpilot to her, but they were pretty easy to replace considering all the ships we took.”
Aubrey gripped the armrests. “Do you even hear what you’re saying? You are deliberately destroying people’s lives!”
“So? What do I care? It’s making me rich.” The captain shifted next to him, flipping switches. “It’s just the way the universe works, kid; either you’re predator or prey.”
Aubrey folded his arms. “That’s a total pile of shit.”
“Hey, I’m not the one going back into a liquid tank at the end of this trip to play subroutine to another ship.”
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Aubrey’s temper flared hot. He shook with anger. “No, you’re the one whose ship got blown all to hell because you wandered into the wrong territory.”
“That was not my idea. The reason our asses got blown all to hell is because that damned ship shut down all external sensors and decided to pick a fight with the pilot.
We didn’t even know we were in Skeldhi territory and under attack until damage
reports started coming in.”
“Good for Niobe.” Aubrey blinked and realized that he was seeing shapes. He could almost make out the dashboard right in front of him. He looked to his left and could just make out the hulking shape of a man next to him.
“You know, if I thought I could beat you without killing you, I’d do it.”
“Like I’d care if you killed me. I’m going back into a liquid tank at the end of this trip, remember?”
“Keep it up with the mouth, kid.” The captain scowled, not a good look on his scarred and grizzled face. “I’m sure I can do something to make this trip really uncomfortable without breaking something.”
Aubrey almost smiled. The captain’s face might not be a pretty sight, but his ability to even see it meant that escape was actually possible. If it weren’t for the fucking beacon collar. Even if he did escape, he wouldn’t get far. He licked his lips. But maybe he could get far enough to kill himself… “How long do we have until rescue?”
“What, change your mind about dying?”
Aubrey winced. Shit.
The captain grinned at him. “Ha, you did, didn’t you?” He turned back to his controls. “Don’t worry. It’ll only be a matter of hours.”
Hours? Aubrey sucked in a breath and choked. He only had hours to get far enough to die? The choke became a cough. The cough became a spot of blood on his palm. He stared at in shock.
The captain nodded at him. “Oh yeah, there’s a reason you were living in a tank kid. Without the nanites in the liquid to process oxygen for you, your lung problem is terminal.” His smile was full of blackened teeth. “You can’t breathe real air for more than a week or so. Your lungs were pretty much destroyed on your third trip to the airlock.”
Aubrey turned to him in shock. “You knew about my being in the airlock?”
The captain shrugged. “Who do you think put you in it?”
Ice water filled Aubrey’s veins; then his temper boiled white-hot. He fisted his cupped hand. For the first time in his life, he really wanted to kill someone, and he wanted to do it with his bare hands.
Unfortunately, it was pretty damned obvious that the captain had marine-class robotic augmentation in his limbs. There was no way in hell that he could outfight or even outrun the bastard. He would have to find another way to kill him.
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Chapter Four
The captain leaned back in the pilot’s chair. “Moribund Company ships travel in threes; two next to each other, and the third, one jump behind, to pick up the pieces, if necessary. We had a terminal hit, and the Ravenous was already dead by the time we regained outside sensors. The homing beacon on this baby will send the third ship, the Ferocious, straight for us.” The captain grinned. “You should be back in your tank by this time tomorrow.”
“Great.” Aubrey narrowed his eyes at the captain and then examined the blinking piloting controls. This craft was simplistic compared to the yachts he’d joyridden in.
Maybe he didn’t have to escape. Maybe he could kill the bastard in a crash.
And take himself out with him.
All he needed was some way into the ship’s controls. Aubrey turned to look behind him. The craft was very small. The exit was directly behind them. The sleeping bays took up either wall with food service beyond the right bed and the facility beyond the left. He raised a brow. If this craft was like a few of the other small-hoppers he’d borrowed, there was an engineering access panel in the floor of the facility. But how the fuck was he going to access it without a data-cable?
“Hey, kid?”
Aubrey turned to look at the captain. “What?”
The captain raised a brow at him. “You know how to fly one of these things?”
Aubrey blinked. It couldn’t be that easy. “Well, yeah. I have limited piloting capability. Why do you think I was in that tank?”
The captain sneered. “Because you know how to break into them. The real question is, can you fly this one?”
Aubrey rolled his eyes. “Yes, I can fly this one. Why?”
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The captain unbuckled his harness. “I have got to take a piss, and if you don’t mind, I could use some sleep.” He rose from the pilot’s couch. “Once we get on the surface, we may have to deal with a Skeldhi hunting party or two. Not to put too fine a point on it, if you want to keep breathing, you’re going to need me awake and aware to fight them off long enough for rescue to get to us.”
Aubrey blinked. Fuck… It was going to be that easy. He smiled. “Sure, no problem.”
The captain hesitated. His eyes narrowed. “Don’t try anything funny, kid.”
Aubrey set his chin on his hand and raised one brow. “What could I possibly do that you can’t stop me from doing?”
The captain frowned.
Aubrey almost laughed. Don’t strain your brain, Captain. “I’m not augmented, remember?” His smile soured. “And I can’t live outside a tank. If I don’t go back in, I die in a week.”
The captain smiled. “Actually, if you leave the ship, you’ll be dead in a day or so.
The atmosphere is slightly corrosive. No big deal for me, very big deal for you.”
“Fine, you made your point.” Aubrey unbuckled his harness. “Go take your piss and your nap.” He climbed out of his chair.
The captain stood there, frowning.
Aubrey set his hands on his hips. “I only get to be outside a tank for a small amount of time. You have a problem with me enjoying what little time I get?”
The captain’s expression eased into something almost like regret. “Look, I’m sorry, kid, but it’s your own fault you have to breathe water. If you’d agreed to the boss’s deal when we pulled you out of the airlock the first time, you’d be sleeping in a captain’s suite, not a tank. You’re that valuable. Seriously, if I survive this without you, I’m a dead man.”
Aubrey looked away and crossed his arms. You just don’t get it, asshole.
“Tell you what, I’ll see that you get out of the tank every once in a while so you can at least get laid.”
Aubrey tilted his head and faced the planetary horizon line visible on the forward view-screen, turning his back on the hulking captain. “Sure, fine, whatever.”
The captain sighed and turned away.
Aubrey dropped into the pilot’s chair and activated the nav-pilot access. The mechanical feed at the back of the chair interlinked with his data-jack. Raw information poured into his skull. His imagination translated the data into stars and a slowly turning planet. It wasn’t nearly as extensive as what a nav-pilot would see, but it was more control than the captain had driving cold mechanics with his hands.
He crossed his arms and proceeded to plot his demise. He didn’t bother to buckle in. The point was to ensure that he didn’t survive the crash.
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* * * * *
The small shuttle dipped below the planet’s cloud level with the captain snoring up a storm in the bed directly behind Aubrey. Uneven, rock-tumbled terrain spread beneath the ship. Patches of twisted trees and scattered hardscrabble brush seemed to be the only signs of life.
Aubrey tapped his finger on the armrest while piloting the ship closer to the surface. Death had to be really fast, or the captain would awaken and possibly stop the crash. He needed something to crash into, like…a mountain, if he could find one.
His sensors picked up a small craft unfamiliar in conformation following his trail.
It was not a Moribund ship or an Imperium craft. It had to be Skeldhi.
Aubrey’s brows rose. Who needed a mountain when he could just get his ass blasted by an enemy ship? Oddly, something his father said a very long time ago came to mind. “The enemy of my enemy is my friend.”
He smiled and shifted the trajectory to make it easier for the other ship to catch him and shut down all the proximity alarms. The last thing he needed
was the captain waking up and stopping him. He leaned back and set his hands behind his head, while listening to the captain’s loud snores. A smile played on his lips. Finally, all his misery was going to end, nice and fast.
The ship shuddered hard and whirled into a spinning curve that flung it from the other ship’s path.
Aubrey grabbed for control. He needed to get back into that ship’s path if he was going to make sure he didn’t survive.
The captain rolled—or rather fell—from the bed. “What the fuck is going on?”
Aubrey rolled his eyes. “We have been hit by enemy fire, and we are currently spinning out of control.”
“Give me that!”
Aubrey was hauled from the pilot’s chair and practically thrown onto the other chair.
“Go!” The captain dropped into the pilot seat. “Strap yourself in! I’ll get us down in one piece.”
Aubrey rose from the chair. No, damn it! He was going to crash this damned ship if he had to pry the engineering panel up from the floorboards with his bare hands.
The ship bucked hard.
Aubrey fell to the deck.
The captain choked. “Bloody fucking Fate! Where the hell did that come from?”
Aubrey grinned. Hot damn! They were under fire again. The other ship had found them. Fate was finally smiling!
“What the fuck? The proximities are off! Kid, what did you do?”
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“Who, me?” Aubrey rolled onto his back, tucked his hands behind his head, and folded one knee over the other, kicking his foot absently. “Not a damned thing.”
“Get your ass back in the chair! We’re about to crash and crash hard!”
Aubrey smiled. “No, thanks, I’m good.”
“Are you trying to die?”
Aubrey rolled over onto his stomach and smiled at the captain. “Why, yes I am, you fucking moron.”
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