Shades of Allegiance

by Sandy Williams

  “The causeway is down,” Hillis said.

  Scius’s nostrils flared. His hand tightened on his gun. His whole body trembled with the rage building inside him.

  “It’s only been down seconds, Scius,” Ash said. “Release Hauch and the others, then stay out of my way. I’ll restart the tram. No one has to know you lost control.”

  “You.” The sound was more a breath than a word.

  She kept her weight in her toes, her knees ever so slightly bent, ready to spring should his jaw relax. That was his tell, his unconscious signal that he’d come to a decision. There was no guarantee she could get out of the way in time, but she was quicker and stronger than a normal person, even a normal soldier. She’d live long enough to—

  He roared, turned, and fired.

  Bullets sprayed the chamber, pinging off the walls, the ceiling, the cages. Scius kept squeezing the trigger, creating a thundering cacophony she felt in her chest. He fired until his weapon clicked empty, then he launched the now useless weapon at Hauch’s cage.

  Hauch wasn’t hurt. At least he wasn’t hurt more than when he’d been shoved into the damn cage.

  The soldier shook his head slowly, rage and reprimand burning in his eyes.

  I know. I know. You’re my biggest fan.

  She turned her attention back to Scius. His meltdown had brought more dregs into the chamber. They entered through the back door and through the front entrance, passing by cages that now dripped blood. Scius had killed more than half his captives.

  A mercy. Even if their bodies could have healed from what he’d done to them, their minds never would have.

  “Your tantrums haven’t improved,” she said to Scius.

  “Give me the fucking code,” he snarled.

  “No,” she said. The simple response made his face turn more purple than red.

  “I will cut your fingers off one by one.”

  “That will make it difficult to enter the code.”

  Again, his face darkened. Maybe he’d drop dead of an aneurysm.

  “Your fucking mouth.” He stepped closer. “I will destroy you.”

  She lowered her voice to match his. “Every second you waste, you destroy yourself. Your enemies won’t question a minute or two delay, but keep the causeway down for longer than that? How long before they come for you?”

  He still hadn’t moved close enough for her to grab. If she made a move at this distance, his dregs would have time to draw their weapons. Somewhere around thirty people now watched the spectacle. She recognized a good number of faces. Two or three of them she used to be on good terms with.

  His eyes were so dark they were almost black, but she could picture them ringed with red. He was a monster realizing his reign of terror might not last.

  “This is what you planned five years ago, isn’t it?” he said. Somehow he managed to sound both empty and thoughtful. “You weren’t after my ship. You were always after the causeway.”

  “It gives you your power.”

  A slow smile curled his lips. “Take it away, and I lose it all. You always did know how to find a man’s weakness. But your weakness hasn’t changed, you know. You are still as arrogant as ever.”

  A warning switch flicked on, sending a bolt of caution down her spine. She knew when an op was about to go to hell. She could feel it on her skin, sense the bomb ticking down.

  Hillis moved, just one slow step to the side, but he was like a razorback predicting the spill of blood.

  “Give me the key and get out,” Ash said.

  “Ash,” he admonished. “You made the wrong call with the Rancor. You’ve made the wrong one now too. I’d rather lose the causeway than let you have one fucking second of success.”

  Ash couldn’t move fast enough, and Hauch couldn’t move out of the way. Scius drew a blade and sank it into the soldier’s gut.

  22

  Ash screamed and rammed Scius into the ground.

  Hillis rushed forward. Ash took a blow from Scius so that she could roll him between her and Hillis’s raised gun. When Scius went for her throat, she slammed her head into his nose.

  Blood splattered her face, almost blinding her. She pivoted her hips and kicked up and out when Hillis lunged for her.

  Hillis doubled over, hissing and swearing and clutching himself.

  Ash threw an elbow into Scius’s temple. Threw another one and would have managed a third had something not slammed into her back.

  Pain shot down her spine. She twisted in time to see another dreg pull back his leg to kick her again.

  Ash moved her head out of the way, grabbed his ankle, and flipped him to the ground.

  But others rushed her now. Too many to count.

  Scius wrapped a heavily muscled arm around her neck. She slipped out of the hold. Punched him in the face.

  Bullets boomed through the air. They pelted the floor, pinged off cages. One penetrated deep into her left shoulder blade.

  She rolled toward Hillis, grabbed for the gun he aimed toward the chamber’s entrance.

  She wrenched it free, but a bullet hit her arm. The weapon spun away.

  Hillis drew a knife, slashed toward her neck.

  When he missed, Ash slammed her palm into his wrist, knocking the knife from his grip like the bullet had knocked the gun from hers. Instead of the knife flying out of reach, she caught it and plunged it into his throat.

  Scius’s dregs fell to the ground around her, some dead or injured, some cowering low to avoid being hit. Others dropped to take aim.

  Ash spotted Hillis’s gun the same second Scius did. She scrambled for it, but the boss was closer. He scooped it up and pointed it at her head.

  “Drop the weapons!” a voice bellowed.

  Every molecule of air in Ash’s lungs turned into a needle that pricked her insides. She didn’t turn, didn’t look away from Scius and his gun and the victory shining in his eyes.

  “Welcome to Glory, Commander,” Scius said.

  No, no, no. He couldn’t be there. He couldn’t. Chace had promised. Emmit had given his word.

  “Drop the weapon,” Rykus repeated.

  “What a fucking honor this is.” Scius rose to his feet. “The hero of Gaeles Minor, gracing Glory with his presence. What could possibly bring you all the way out here?” He looked at Ash, took a small step toward her. “It wouldn’t be for her, would it?” He waived the gun in her face.

  Slowly she stood.

  “A unit of Coalition soldiers is on its way,” Rykus said.

  Scius smiled, and a chuckle passed through his remaining dregs.

  Ash eased to the left, an attempt to put herself between Scius and Rykus.

  “No, no, Ash,” Scius said. “Stay where you are. Commander. Chace. Why don’t you come join her over here?”

  She turned her head to look over her shoulder. Chace held his Secca Nine aimed toward a cluster of dregs. Rykus aimed his weapon at Scius.

  Another almost suffocating panic swept through her. Scius knew who he was. His smirk said he’d known he was coming, had likely ordered his dregs to ease off and allow him in.

  “Chace,” she snarled. She would kill him.

  His gaze flickered to her. “You were walking into a trap.”

  “I had it handled, and you had one job.”

  “My one job is to keep you alive.” Chace didn’t look away from his targets. He could probably take two or three down before they killed him. Not enough.

  “If you had a problem, you should have stopped me,” she said, stalling. She needed the dynamics to change, to shift in a way that would give her some chance to save…

  No. Rykus wouldn’t let her save him. He’d be with her until the end. The only way to get him through this alive was to take down Scius and hope like hell one or two of his dregs turned on the others. It was possible. They might work for Scius, benefit from proximity to him, but no one fucking liked the boss.

  Scius sighed and nonchalantly nudged Hauch’s cage. It swung, and the blood drip
ping from the soldier’s unmoving body created pendulum circles on the cold floor. “You have always caused so much drama, Ash. Treasons and betrayals and manipulations that circle around to harm everyone but you. The biggest mistake of your worthless life was crossing me. On your knees.”

  When she didn’t comply, he shifted his aim to point at Rykus. Plenty still pointed at her though, and she was unarmed. She didn’t know how to save him.

  “On your knees, Ash, or he will get a bullet in his brain.”

  “Don’t move,” Rykus ordered.

  Her muscles twitched. Her fail-safe hadn’t used the tone and cadence that triggered the compulsion, but fear kept her from breathing. It felt like she was back in the clutches of Valt’s telepathic stranglehold. She was torn between two impossible choices, a blackout just on the horizon.

  “Mira had so much to say about the two of you.” Scius beamed. “She divulged it all before I finally let her die. Told me you are an anomaly, you’re loyalty trained, enslaved to the Coalition and to him. She told me you’re fucking him. I must say, I’m jealous. Your performance was always top-notch.”

  His appraisal turned lewd. He’d likely had the same expression when he was torturing Mira, forcing her to talk.

  “You have ten seconds.” Rykus’s voice echoed in the chamber.

  “Until what?” Scius asked. “Until your little unit gets here?”

  “Five seconds.”

  Scius tsked and shook his head. “You’re going to be very disappointed.”

  “Two.”

  “Commander.” Scius’s tone was patronizing. “I own every soldier on Glory.”

  “I never said they were from Glory.”

  An explosion boomed through the chamber, through her, but she’d already started moving, was already halfway to Scius.

  He fired. Others fired. War erupted around them. Heat singed her skin.

  She reached Scius, who was stumbling backward. He kept his finger on his gun’s trigger, firing blindly until his eyes focused on her.

  A bullet skimmed her shoulder.

  Her fist hit his face. The gun went flying, and she hit him again.

  He yelled and dug his thumb into the bullet hole just below her clavicle. Her entire right arm went numb. She used her left hand to claw for his eyes.

  His thumb sank in farther.

  She couldn’t see Rykus, couldn’t see Chace, couldn’t see anything but the bastard in front of her. His dregs wouldn’t stop fighting as long as he was alive.

  He knocked her hand away from his face, then threw his fist into her stomach.

  Air whooshed out of her lungs. Pain made the edges of her vision go fuzzy. He was heavier than her. He was strong. She was weakening from too much blood loss. She didn’t have much time before he’d overpower her.

  She tried for a choke hold, tried for an armlock, an Idrician bane-clench. She was too slick with sweat and blood. She needed a weapon.

  Another punch to the gut, this one breaking ribs. She rolled out of his reach, half rose to her feet.

  Scius jeered at her. Bullets whistled past them, a fire burned on the crumbled western wall, and Hauch’s cage rocked to her right.

  Ash roared, grabbed the dagger still lodged in Hauch’s gut, and slashed.

  Scius stumbled.

  Stopped.

  His face twisted with confusion. Frowning, he looked down.

  Blood flooded out of him like a thick red waterfall. His innards bulged from the wound.

  His nostrils flared. His eyes rose to meet hers, and he blinked again, then again. He blinked incessantly.

  “Ash.” He choked on a cough, and the gash across his stomach separated farther, allowing his intestines to spill out.

  Another glance down.

  “You bitch,” he whispered.

  “You shouldn’t have fucked with me, Scius.”

  He hit his knees, crumpled sideways, and fell.

  They wouldn’t surrender.

  Rykus had hoped the explosion and the appearance of sixteen Coalition soldiers would have cowed the dregs into submission, but Chace had been right. They wouldn’t risk Scius’s wrath as long as he lived.

  Rykus tried to take the boss out, but he’d taken two shots to the chest, both blocked by the longcoat’s armored interior, and Ash had tackled Scius. Rykus couldn’t get a clean shot off, and he’d had to take cover behind a defunct cooling block.

  To his left, the wall had blown inward, peeled open like a palm fruit. Insulation burned among the twisted metal, and smoke stung his eyes even though a significant amount of it billowed up and away from the compound.

  He squeezed his eyes shut for a count of three, then leaned around the cooling block’s edge and took aim.

  The dreg in his crosshairs had lowered his weapon. Rykus hesitated, then followed the man’s line of sight to Ash and to Scius. The latter dropped to the ground in a dark puddle of his own blood.

  The whistles and bangs of guns and the nonlethal weapons the Coalition soldiers carried—a group he’d called in from the tachyon capsule—slowed until they faded away altogether.

  Rykus straightened. Ash’s gaze locked on him.

  Relief knocked the air loose from his lungs. He was pissed that she’d tried to send him away, tried to protect him. Pissed that she’d risked herself yet again and pissed that he couldn’t stay away from her. She dented his heart with every scheme, every mission, every insane risk she took. He had irreparable cracks in his soul, but Seeker’s God, he couldn’t stop loving her.

  He took a step toward her. Before he took a second one, she tensed, and a loud, solitary clap echoed through the chamber once.

  Then another clap again.

  And another.

  A man emerged from the back entrance. He wore a Ratharian-styled shirt tucked into black pants and comm-cuffs on both his wrists. Dark, neatly trimmed hair contrasted with the bright blue of his eyes, and his movements, the way he strolled through the carnage practically oblivious to it all, radiated competence and control.

  Neilan Tahn.

  Rykus had seen images of the crime lord a decade ago when he’d been assigned to the task force given the mission to track him down. Those recordings had been outdated by at least another ten years. The man taking ownership of the room now had none of the youth that had been in the young Tahn’s face. He had more wisdom, more cunning, more experience running an intergalactic crime ring.

  “I was beginning to think you were overrated,” Tahn said, studying Ash. She hadn’t moved, not so much as a millimeter.

  Apprehension mixed with the sweat trickling down Rykus’s spine.

  “Let’s lower our weapons, shall we?” Tahn said, his gaze not wavering from Ash’s. Rykus didn’t remember pointing his Covar in Tahn’s direction. He hadn’t noticed the others—the soldiers and the few remaining dregs—point theirs either.

  “Quickly now,” Tahn said. “Before more lives are lost.”

  “Ash,” Rykus said quietly. She still hadn’t moved. He wasn’t even sure she’d blinked. If this son of a bitch was in her head, he was dropping him, and to hell with the consequences.

  “I’ve got this, Rip,” she said. She sounded hollow.

  Slowly he lowered his Covar. The soldiers followed his lead and let their weapons dip toward the floor. The dregs didn’t though. Likely, they had no idea who this man was.

  Tahn’s chin dipped in the smallest nod.

  Bullets punched holes into the heads of every man with a raised weapon. They crumpled almost as one, their bodies hitting the ground the only sound aside from a few profanities from the other men.

  Rykus’s heart slammed against his chest. Two, maybe three snipers, hid in the metal beams over their heads. He caught sight of one, barely a shadow. He could guess another was near a central fan. That’s where he would have been if he’d had the time and opportunity to climb up there. They could take everyone on the floor out one by one if they chose. They could have taken them out anytime during the fight with Scius. />
  “Trevast,” Ash said, unfazed by the death around her. “You wanted him to kill me.”

  “Clear the room please,” Tahn said. His posture was relaxed, his tone light.

  Two men who Rykus had thought were dregs turned on the rest of the group, pointing them toward the back door. The dregs began to leave. So did most of the soldiers.

  “Sir?” one of the latter said, looking at Rykus.

  “Go on,” he told him.

  The man didn’t look happy about it, but he followed the others toward the exit.

  “Not that one,” Tahn said, still studying Ash. “He may remain a moment.”

  It took a second to realize who he was talking about. Then the man in front of Chace motioned him toward Tahn.

  Finally Tahn turned. “Ash has once again upended one of my enterprises. I need a replacement for that.” He flung his hand toward Scius’s body. “Perhaps you know someone who could reorganize his assets.”

  Chace glanced at Ash.

  “She’s not an option,” Tahn said.

  Rykus shifted his weight, hoping the movement hid how he eased slightly to the left. Yes, there up near the far corner was the third sniper. All three were perfectly spaced. He wouldn’t be able to take them down before they killed him.

  “She’s the best option,” Chace said. “Dregs united behind her before. They’ll unite again.”

  Tahn shook his head and looked toward the ceiling. Rykus half expected a bullet to hit between Chace’s eyes, but Tahn’s glance was annoyance, not a signal.

  “You will take over. You will use the connections you built for Ash, and you will control the dampeners and the causeway. Every transaction and piece of information on this planet will go through you, and you will report it all to me. If you do not meet or surpass Scius’s performance, you will be eliminated, and I will appoint someone more competent. Am I understood?”

  Chace’s jaw clenched. “I won’t be Scius.”

  “Good. He was a demented naf-ass.” Tahn clasped his hands behind his back. “You may leave.”

  Chace glanced at Ash. When she didn’t look at him, his face tightened. He turned and walked away.