by R. M. Olson
Because this—this was going to be spectacular.
CHAPTER TWENTY
TAE JUMPED TO his feet. Every muscle in his body was tense with a mixture of fear and desperate hope.
“Ysbel.” Lev said briskly, pulling up his own holoscreen and standing. “Here are the ship specs. Where would they have planted the explosives?”
Ysbel moved over to stand next to him, and Tae felt his shoulders relax.
It was almost a dizzying relief to have the old Lev back, finally.
Ivan shot him a quick grin, despite the fear on his face. “Nice to not be pulling the entire load yourself?” he whispered, and Tae smiled back despite himself.
Ysbel glanced up. “Well, we’re in luck. Or possibly out of luck, depending on your viewpoint,” she said. “What I created was something to vaporize the inside of the ship first and take down the external walls afterwards. So. Unless they’re complete idiots, which I suppose we can’t necessarily discount, they’ll have to put it as close to centre as they can, which means this floor. ”
“Can you get to it?” Lev asked.
Ysbel raised an eyebrow. “Between Tanya and me, I’d be surprised if we couldn’t.” She glanced down again, frowning at the screen. “It looks like there will be an access port I can disable, as long as we can get a heat-gun off one of the mafia boyeviki before we go.”
Lev nodded slowly, biting the inside of his cheek. “Alright. That’s what we’ll do then.”
“Well. I suppose we’d best get ready,” said Ysbel. She turned to her children. “You two. Under the bed, and your mamochka and I will drag the table in front. Olya, hold on to your brother.”
“Yes Mama,” said Olya. Her voice was meek, there was excitement twinkling in her eyes, and Lev gave her a small smile.
Minutes later, the children were barricaded under the bed, the overturned table pulled in front of them, which, Tae supposed, was as safe as it was possible to be when you were on a ship scheduled to be blown into space-dust and awaiting a hit squad from the mafia.
Tae pulled up the vid feed on his holoscreen, and Lev peered over his shoulder.
“Alright Tanya,” Lev said quietly. “I think we’re as ready as we can be.”
She gave him a tight grin, and with a quick motion, squeezed the tiny controller.
There was the audible “pop” of the explosion, followed by a thick trail of smoke, then a lick of flame up around the artificial vine. And then the alarms shrieked, the blaring wail of them driving spikes into Tae’s eardrums even from one deck up.
Jez turned to him, a huge grin on her face, and he grinned back despite himself.
The floor below was quickly devolving into complete chaos, gamblers shoving back tables and chairs to get away, pushing past each other, liquid spraying from the ceilings, soaking the expensive carpets.
And in one corner, he could see Fyodor, face furious, shouting and gesticulating at a small group of boyeviki.
“They’re on their way,” he said tensely, slapping the holoscreen closed.
Jez’s grin grew, if possible, wider.
“Then I suppose we’d better get ready for them,” said Ysbel, with a grim smile.
They didn’t have weapons, but Ysbel armed them by the simple expedient of smashing one of the chairs hard against the floor, and handing out pieces of the shattered wood.
“Tae?” whispered Ivan, as they crouched behind the door. “If I happen to die in this—”
“You won’t,” said Tae through his teeth.
Ivan gave a slight, strained chuckle. “I’d forgotten. This is a routine part of the job with you people, isn’t it?”
The door burst open.
“Go!” Lev shouted through gritted teeth. Tanya twisted gracefully around the shimmering ball of heat blasts that melted the air around them, Ysbel at her heels. One of the boyeviki grabbed for them, then crumpled as Tanya brought the edge of her hand down in a swift motion against the side of his neck.
Then they were past the boyeviki and out into the corridor, and Tae breathed a shallow sigh of relief.
“Tae!”
He spun, and brought the broken piece of wood hard across the wrist of the boyevik who’d been in the process of raising her heat pistol to his head, and at the same time, Ivan brought his makeshift weapon down across the back of her knees.
She crumpled, groaning, and he scooped up the pistol and tossed it underhand to Lev, who, while he was a good man to have on your side, didn’t show off his talents to best advantage in a hand-to-hand brawl.
He could hear Jez, by the door, drawling breathless insults, and, from the sounds of things, inflicting injuries which should hardly have been possible with a piece of broken wood.
The air crackled and hissed with heat-blasts, and the temperature in the room was growing steadily unbearable.
He dropped as a heat-blast hit the wall where he’d been standing, then staggered to his feet and lunged for the man who’d shot. The boyevik took a step back, and then Tae hit him, shoulder slamming into his chest, and they both went down. For a frantic moment they struggled for the pistol, then there was a sickening crunch, and the man went limp. Tae glanced up. Jez, broken chair-leg in hand, dark hair wet with sweat and blood trickling from a cut across her forehead, gave him a jaunty wink and stepped over the fallen boyevik. Tae twisted the gun from the man’s limp hand and scrambled up. He brushed the sweat quickly from his eyes and looked around the room.
Lev had positioned himself beside the bed where the children were hidden, and as Tae glanced over, he cooly sent a heat-blast into the shoulder of a woman who’d grabbed for the table Ysbel had set up as a shield. The woman gave a strangled scream of pain, and Lev stepped out of the way as she collapsed, writhing, on the ground.
The boyeviki seemed to have realized that now the people they’d expected to find bound and weaponless were loose and armed with heat pistols, the odds had shifted somewhat, were backing towards the door, firing indiscriminately.
Jez stepped forward and grabbed the edge of the door as one of them tried to swing it shut.
“Don’t think so, you plaguer,” she drawled, yanking it open. The man holding it took an involuntary step forward, tripped, and fell into her.
She stumbled, and the woman behind him kicked her viciously, and she went down on her hands, and everything seemed to switch to slow motion.
The woman raised her heat pistol and pointed it at Jez’s head. Tae swore, shoving past a boyeviki, trying to get to her. From the corner of his eye he saw Lev turn, grabbing for his pistol, but they weren’t going to be in time, there was no way they’d be in time …
And then Masha shoved Jez out of the way, and as Jez went sprawling, the heat blast connected squarely with Masha’s chest.
And Masha collapsed in a small heap on the carpet.
For a moment Tae wasn’t sure he’d seen correctly. There was no way—
Jez staggered to her feet, face bloodless, expression grim, and Lev was already half-way across the room, pistol held steady even as he ran, and Tae felt something freeze inside of him. He turned and grabbed the man behind him and dropped him with a single blow to the back of the neck, then swung and hit another of the boyeviki in the throat. The woman went down, choking for breath, and he spun to grab for the next person—
But it was over.
Boyeviki lay strewn across the floor, groaning and clutching their wounds.
Lev walked through them, disarming any who still had their weapons and methodically melting the coms off their wrists. He didn’t seem to be taking particular care to avoid injuring the com’s owners as he did so. Ivan had grabbed the rope they’d been bound with, and was trying hands behind backs with impressive alacrity.
Jez crouched over Masha, tears dripping down her face.
Tae turned, slowly, and walked over to her. He knelt beside her.
“Is she—” he began.
Jez blinked quickly and brushed her sleeve across her face. “I don’t know,” she sai
d dully. “I—I haven’t checked yet.”
He nodded, and after a moment’s hesitation, reached out to pull back Masha’s scorched jacket.
He’d seen heat-blast wounds plenty of times, but the thought of what he’d find under the jacket still had the power to turn his stomach.
There was a hole burned in her shirt, as well, as he’d known there would be.
And under it—
He frowned.
Jez swore, then swore again, a slow grin starting on her face. “Masha, you damn bastard,” she said.
Tae, almost dizzy with stunned relief, reached out gently and touched the thin, blood-soaked heat-shield Masha had been wearing under her shirt. Masha stirred, eyelids fluttering.
“Tae?” she said after a moment, her voice weak.
“I—are you—how did—”
She groaned, braced herself, and pushed up on her elbows. “I’m fine, thank you, Tae,” she said. “Are the rest of you alright?”
He glanced around quickly. “Yes. I—I think so.”
“Jez?”
“Why the hell didn’t you tell us you were wearing a damn heat shield?” grumbled Jez, but she was grinning. “Anyways, yeah, I’m good. Thanks to you, you plaguer.”
Masha grimaced as she rolled onto her side and sat up. “I thought—” She sucked in a sharp breath, then let it out slowly, but Tae could see the pain in her expression. “I thought it would be a wise addition to my wardrobe, considering how much time I was spending with Grigory,” she finished after a moment. “And it appears to have been worth my while.”
Lev joined them. “Masha?” he asked, voice sharp with strain.
“She’s alive, at least,” said Tae, turning to him.
“You alright, Masha?” Jez asked, concern in her voice.
“Yes, thank you, Jez,” said Masha. “As I mentioned earlier, Girgory’s people were not impressed with my performance today, and made their disapproval known with their fists. And while a heat shield does protect you from being killed by a blast, it is still not a pleasant experience. But, it is certainly better than the alternative. And so yes, I’m alright.”
Ivan came over and crouched beside her, and she let him help her to her feet. She stumbled to the bed and dropped onto it with a grimace of relief.
“Thank you,” she said, at last. She looked around the room. “So. I assume, then, that we’re safe until Grigory notices his boyeviki haven’t come back, correct?”
Tae nodded briefly.
“And as you have not spoofed the cameras on this ship, I assume that any attempt to move to a different room would ultimately be unhelpful, correct?”
He nodded again.
“Very well,” said Masha at last. “I suppose, then, we move the boyaviki we’ve disabled somewhere more convenient, and wait to hear back from Ysbel.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
YSBEL AND TANYA sprinted down the corridors towards the centre of the ship. Behind them, Ysbel could hear the unmistakable sound of boyeviki coming into contact with an irate Ungovernable crew.
She was grinning to herself slightly.
The distance itself wasn’t long, but the corridors turned back on themselves, which made sense if you happened to be trying to run a hotel/casino, but was impressively irritating if you were trying to get to the centre shaft as quickly as possible so you could disarm a bomb that was about to turn the entire place into floating space-rubble.
“Here,” said Tanya, catching her arm, and they turned down a smaller maintenance corridor.
Ysbel glanced at her wife as they ran. Her face still had a hint of that hard expression she’d seen on it so often these past few days, and something inside her hurt to see it.
“Tanya,” she said at last, ducking down another corridor. “What’s wrong? Please tell me.”
Tanya glanced over at her.
Ahead of them, two of Grigory’s boyeviki stepped out of a corridor, saw them, and grabbed for their guns.
“One moment,” said Ysbel, yanking her modded heat pistol out of her jacket pocket. The two boyeviki raised their guns as well.
“Let me,” whispered Tanya, and slipped ahead of her. She knocked both the gangsters’ gun hands up, and both weapons went off, leaving scorch marks on the corridor ceiling. She grabbed one of them and took him down with a sharp blow to the side of the neck, and Ysbel grabbed the other, twisting the woman’s arm up behind her back and shoving her head-first into the wall. The woman went limp, and Ysbel let her drop as Tanya pulled open a room door.
“In here,” she said, and Ysbel kicked the groaning boyevik inside as Tanya slammed the door closed.
They smiled at each other, and set off running again.
Ahead of them, a maintenance tunnel split off from the corridor.
“Down here, I think,” said Ysbel. Tanya nodded, pointed the heat pistol she’d grabbed from the fallen boyevik, and sent three blasts in short succession.
The door swung gently on its hinges, lock completely melted, and Ysbel caught it with the toe of her boot, swinging it open.
They ducked inside, and Tanya hit the light on her com. The passage was narrow and claustrophobic, bare steel walls glinting in the com light. Ysbel glanced quickly in both directions, and jerked her head to the right.
“This way. We’ve got to get closer to the centre of the ship before we can start looking.”
Tanya nodded, and followed, their footsteps echoing off the bare metal walls as they ran.
“I’m—sorry, Ysi,” Tanya said at last, her voice low. “I—I felt like you weren’t listening. I felt like you were making any decision you wanted to make on your own, and—” she broke off a moment, shaking her head. “And I am wondering, now, if we remember how to be married. It’s been a long time.”
Ysbel slowed for a moment, glancing over her shoulder at her wife.
“Tanya,” she said at last. “Tanya, you were all I thought about, that whole time. Every moment, every breath.”
Tanya gave a small smile. “I know,” she said quietly. “It was the same with me. But it’s two different things, isn’t it? To think about someone when they’re gone, and to live with them when they’re here?”
Ysbel was silent for a moment as they ran.
They were getting closer, she could feel it. There was a gravity pull to the heart of the ship, and if she were trying to blow this herself, she could follow that feeling blindfolded.
“I—believe I see your point,” she said at last, in a low voice. “You were always the one with the conscience. And I have been ignoring you, haven’t I?”
Tanya glanced at her with a small, wry smile. “I know you were trying to protect our family. But—you can’t do it like this. You can’t do it by pretending we don’t have a say.”
Ysbel looked over her shoulder for a moment, studying her wife’s face, the familiar lines on it and the lines that she still didn’t know, but she was coming to know, because she could never get enough of looking at this woman who she loved.
“All I wanted—all I want—is for you and the children to be alright,” she said at last, and the words almost choked her because of the blind, frantic panic they brought with them. “I lost you once. I lost all of you once, and I couldn’t protect you that time, and I—I can’t do that again. Tanya, I—”
Tanya reached out and took her hand as they ran, and squeezed it, and for a moment the tears in Ysbel’s eyes blurred her vision, and she had to blink them hastily back.
“Down here, I think,” said Tanya, and they turned down another side corridor. Ysbel glanced at her com.
“We should be close. They’ll have to plant it near the main shaft, and—” She paused. Ahead of her, Tanya stopped.
To one side, the maintenance tunnel turned around a bulge in the wall.
Ysbel smiled. “And I think we found it.”
It took longer than it should have to find a way inside. Normally, Ysbel would have simply melted a hole in the metal casing, but she couldn’t predict where
Grigory’s men would have fastened the explosive. It was Tanya who found the way through at last, a small panel hidden in the wall.
“How’s it coming?” Tae asked over the com. His voice was strained.
“I think we’re close,” said Ysbel. “Is everyone there alright?”
“We’re all alive, and no one’s attacking us at the moment,” said Tae. “Which I think is the best we’ll get for some time.”
“I think we’ve located it, at least,” said Ysbel. “Give us a few minutes to get the lock, and I’ll be able to access it.”
There was a sick feeling in her stomach as she worked, though, and she saw it mirrored in Tanya’s face.
“You know,” Ysbel muttered, as she clipped the lock scrambler onto the door panel that lay exposed behind the metal panels that made up the wall, “this is much easier when Tae is the one who has to get us through the locks, and I only have to worry about blowing things up.”
Tanya gave a soft laugh, and Ysbel glanced over at her.
Her face was still cut with strain, but she was wearing a small smile. “We all have our talents,” she murmured. “And no one can say that boy isn’t talented.”
The lock scrambler whirred for a moment, then there was a soft click. Holding her breath, Ysbel unclipped it carefully from the panel and tried the handle.
The door swung open.
Ysbel hit the light on her com, and Tanya came up beside her as they stepped through into the darkness.
They were inside a tall, narrow space, filled with the tubing and venting system that supplied the ship’s oxygen and temp control, and in the mess of wires and tubing it took her a few moments to locate the familiar shape of the explosive.
Then she saw it, and almost groaned.
They’d planted it at the top of the tall cylinder, against the wall centimetres from the ceiling.
Ysbel swore under her breath.
She turned to see Tanya smiling at her, that soft, wistful smile Ysbel loved so much it almost made her ache.
“I’ll be right back,” she whispered. “I may have to drop it down though. Can you catch it?”