“That’s a lie,” the guard snarled.
“Then why were we arrested checking to see if any of the kids survived?” Maverick shot back. “Your sisterfucking brothers-in-arms did that, not us.”
“You people kill your own all the time!” the guard shouted.
“That’s because they’re either with us or against us!” Maverick shouted back. “And those kids weren’t with you, so you fucking killed them to get to us.”
A chill went through her. She was not a hero or a martyr. She was just a woman who wanted to live as long as possible. She couldn’t have done that. Any of it. For any side. She was no hero.
“Kat would’ve been a hero.”
“What?” Maverick asked.
She didn’t realize she’d said it aloud. She sucked in a breath and said, “I have to go.”
“What’s your name, Earth? Maybe my friends know you.” He snorted. “Then again, I doubt my friends know any collaborators.”
“I’m not a collaborator,” Rebecca said weakly.
“Don’t fall for his bullshit mind games. This is why you’re not allowed to talk to him,” the guard said, clearly exasperated.
“You’re certainly not a rebel,” Maverick said.
“I surrendered,” Rebecca said simply. “To save my family’s life.”
Maverick’s features turned hard. “Are they still alive? Your family, I mean. See, they promised to keep mine alive, too. My parents didn’t even make it a day. So don’t you worry, little Earther. One day, you’ll be trussed up in here waiting for the needle. So just tell me your name.”
“My name is Rebecca St. Martin. I doubt anyone from Earth remembers me.” She took a deep breath and turned to walk out of the isolation ward.
As the door closed behind her, Maverick said, “I’m sure Katherine still remembers you.”
Chapter 12
Countdown Timer: 44 Hours remaining
Katherine stared at the screen in front of her. Sinking horror settled into her guts. “Adjutant, confirm information accuracy.”
The female voice replied into Katherine’s ear piece. “Verified. Zain Ravi is a Blackout operative who has been stationed out of Jupiter for two years, and at his current infiltration post for eight months. Most of his mission details, as well as his true identity, are unavailable.”
“Is this part about monitoring Rebecca and some of the others true?”
“Yes. Captain Dags was aware of Zain Ravi’s mission to monitor several members of Jupiter’s maintenance teams to evaluate security risks, potential future special agents, scapegoats, and other intelligence.”
“Shit.” Katherine did not like the sound of that. “And Rebecca was being monitored all this time?”
“She was under constant surveillance up until you changed her security clearance.”
“Is my access high enough to monitor him?”
“You do not have clearance for his Blackout work, but you can monitor his station activities.”
“Show me that, and identify any patterns.”
“Going how far back?”
“Compare the previous two weeks of his activity before my arrival to since my arrival.”
“Running. This will take two hours.”
“Alert me when it’s done, even if I’m asleep.”
“Understood.”
Katherine rubbed her forehead, even if it did nothing to ward off the growing headache. It was bad enough that she’d had to bump up the timer for the mission. Now, she had a sneaking suspicion that Rebecca’s little fucktoy knew more than he should. She’d rather not dump him into the incinerator if she could avoid it – no way she could cover up another systems failure. Not that she cared one way or another about some Corps bastard, but she had a tight schedule and murdering someone would cut into her time.
Katherine went back to assembling the incendiary devices that would be used to take out her entire wing of suites. She had another three to make before rigging them up to her electrical panel. Anything to slow down military personal from showing up to assist in the lower wards would be a good thing.
And, hell, if a few dozen of these murdering bastards died in the mess, all the better.
*****
Rebecca took a deep breath and said, “Assistant, search for Captain Katherine Frances, Canadian Armed Forces, Earth.”
“Searching InComm. Would you like me to access the secure files as well?”
“I can’t see those,” Rebecca said idly as she sat on the edge of her futon, gripping the lumpy mattress.
“You have full security access to all ship-wide security files up to level 2A.”
Rebecca looked up at her computer screen and asked, “How?”
“When Captain Andrewsen granted you security clearance, she also gave you access to various secure files on the station.”
“Why would she do that?”
The question was more for herself than the assistant, but her VA answered anyway. “She is a Blackout captain. She has the authority to do as she sees necessary for the mission.”
“Okay. Let’s…no wait. Can you look up my parents first? Is there information on them?”
“Wendy and Malcolm St. Martin. Missing, declared dead,” the VA said without any emotion in her voice. “Would you like me to bring up the official report?”
Rebecca wept as she read her parents’ names over and over on the mission report about the siege of Halifax. She’d been told her parents were alive and would be taken to a secure and safe location outside of the city. She’d done this entire thing for her parents’ well-being, and they were already dead when they made her the offer.
God in heaven who’d forsaken them all, she was a fucking idiot. Of course her parents were dead. Why else hadn’t they contacted her all of these years? Captain Dags had once told her that they were in a witness protection program and that contacting them would flag them for terrorist spies and we couldn’t have that now, could we? That lying bastard knew they were dead and lied to her to keep her pliant.
And if they’d lied about her parents, maybe they lied about Kat, too.
“Bring up everything on Captain Katherine Frances, Canadian Armed Forces, Earth.”
Kat’s file was extensive. She’d been severely injured in the coffee shop attack, but hadn’t actually died. She needed extensive plastic surgery and, because of that, the Corps didn’t have updated scans or even decent images of her. Even her voice had been altered in the attack. She was wanted in connection to seventeen terrorist attacks, including the destruction of a mining colony. She was considered armed and dangerous, and on several top most-wanted terrorists’ lists. There were rewards for the confirmation of her identity. There were “shoot to kill” orders out on her.
The metaphorical pit fell out of Rebeca’s stomach and splashed on the floor. She’d known in her heart that it was Kat, but she’d pretended and justified and talked herself out of it. Her subconscious didn’t need proof, nor did it care that Rebecca was too isolated from that inner voice to have listened to reason. Her thinking brain had wanted proof, but her heart already knew. That’s why she was dreaming about her so much. That’s why she couldn’t stop thinking about her during her waking hours. That’s why her heart skipped a beat whenever she looked at the captain’s cold, soulless eyes.
Kat was alive.
She was working for a terrorist. She was associating with a terrorist. When Kat was found out—and make no mistake, the Corps would find her out—they’d know instantly that Rebecca and Kat had once been together. It wouldn’t take much of a stretch for them to assume Rebecca and she were still together and conspiring.
Oh God, what had Kat had her doing down in the prison ward? She had been so thrown by Kat that she barely asked any questions about what she was doing in the wards.
Kat was alive.
It was that program. The audit was a fake. It was that damn security protocol she was uploading. Rebecca would bet her entire credit account that it was a virus or some o
ther form of sabotage that was going to…what? Oh, of course. Break out the prisoners. She was there to get those poor bastards out of the prison cells.
Kat was going to get her killed.
Kat was alive.
Rebecca gripped the edge of her futon and desperately tried to control her breathing. Her vision blurred the harder her heart pounded. All of this time she was sure Kat was dead and here was the security file right in front of her. Not only not dead, but very much alive and wanted on eleven planets for terrorist activities, several bombings, and the destruction of a mining facility.
She was going to kill Kat.
Whatever tether that held her together let go and a flood of coolness washed over her. The anxiety in her chest faded. The hollowness melted away, replaced with a frigid core. Her erratic emotions turned to ice.
She was going to kill Kat.
“Where is Captain Andrewson’s quarters?”
“A-6.”
“Where is the nearest weapons locker to Captain Andrewson’s quarters?”
“Locker storage 17. Rebecca, are you planning to harm yourself or someone else? If you are, I must report you to security.”
“I want to test out my new security access.” Her words sounded hollow and lifeless. She knew they were coming from her, but she didn’t recognize them.
“Your access card will allow you to check out a personal weapon of your choice to use at the practice range, but you cannot leave the area with it. You don’t have the correct clearance.”
Rebecca considered for a moment and looked down at her tool kit. A laser scalpel or a welding arc would do just as well. She pulled out the laser scalpel that resembled a glue gun and stuffed it into her overalls’ pocket. Then she snatched her pass card and headed out, ignoring her podmates, who were eating snacks while watching the game.
Rebecca weaved her way through the crowds and ignored anyone she recognized, even as they called out to her in words she didn’t know. Zain waved at her and had detoured to intercept her, but she ignored him and quickened her pace to the security checkpoint into military quarters.
“Hey Rebecca, what’s up?” the guard, Winston, asked.
“I need in.”
“Sorry, you don’t have the security access. If there’s someone I can call…”
Rebecca handed him her card. “I need in.”
He scanned it and his eyes went wide. He looked back at her, then at the screen, and back at her. “Um…is this a joke?”
“No,” Rebecca said coldly. “Keep it to yourself and let me the fuck in.”
“Yes…um…wow. Um, does Zain know?”
“Not unless you tell him.” Rebecca leaned forward. “Do you plan to tell him?”
“No, ma’am,” Winston said, straightening his back. “Sorry, ma’am, for questioning your identity.”
Rebecca snatched her pass card back and marched in past the checkpoint. She’d never been in this wing, not even to do repairs, but she focused on the signs on the walls and quickly found Kat’s room.
She leaned on the doorbell of Kat’s room, but there was no answer. Rebecca slammed the decoder she’d been using for the security systems against the display screen. The screen beeped twice and she heard the click of the lock releasing. In a moment of insight, she tugged off her translator implant, and a sense of relief flooded her as the irritated skin got to breath. She popped the little round bit into her pocket.
She strolled into the room, welding gun pointed like a real pistol, and stared down at her ex. Kat—oh, that lying bitch on the floor was Kat, there was no mistake now—had her elbows propped up on a pillow. Portable computer, tablet, phone, and the mobile VA projector. Just another form of Kat’s elaborate gaming system style she used to use at home.
“What the fuck are you doing here?” Kat demanded.
Rebecca responded by taking her translator bud out of her pocket and throwing it on the floor. It jumped twice before landing just beyond Katherine’s tablets. She stared at it, but didn't say anything.
“It’s interesting to hear a Cape Breton accent all the way out here in space,” Rebecca said. She concentrated on pointing the laser gun and not to let her fear and adrenaline make the device waver.
Katherine blew out a breath and said, in English, “So what now? You’re going to shoot me with a...is that a laser gun?”
“It was easier to get than a rifle,” Rebecca said coldly.
“You’d just hurt yourself,” Katherine said, not even bothering to hide her disdain. “Put that down and get out. I’m busy.”
“Don’t you dare give me orders, Kat!”
*****
A lot went through Katherine’s mind as she stared up at Rebecca. There was the logistics of how Rebecca had figured it out. Did Rebecca tell someone about the plan? Was Rebecca working for the Corps military? Was Zain’s surveillance of Rebecca part of their ruse? Or had Rebecca used her new security access to look up Captain Katherine Frances, Canadian Armed Forces, Earth.
But the mission wasn’t the only thing that went through Katherine’s mind. The last seven years had been hard on Rebecca. There were dark circles under her eyes that hadn’t been there before. Same with the crow’s feet and the cracks on her cheeks, where a plumper Rebecca would have had dimples. She didn’t have the slight weight gain that everyone gets with age. No, she had the opposite: gaunt, haunted features of someone who ate only to live and who debated that choice daily.
“Murder-suicide isn’t really something we go in for in this advanced society,” Katherine said as indifferently as she could muster given the circumstances. “I have a lot of work to do. Get out before I call security and have you arrested.”
If Rebecca lost control, the situation would likely become very messy for Katherine’s brains and the equipment around her. Still, she really did have a lot of work to do. Once that new station commander arrived, all hell was going to break lose. Finding out that Rebecca’s little boy toy was Blackout was not helping, and now it was clear Rebecca had turned the corner into unstable bomb territory. Rowe was under strict instructions to turn this station into a smoldering heap if Katherine turned up dead.
“I’m not leaving until you answer me.”
“You don’t know what you’re doing, Rebecca.”
“Look at me when you talk to me!”
Katherine lifted her gaze up from the monitors and met Rebecca’s eyes. A pang of empathy struck Katherine’s calloused heart, and a cold shiver hit her spine at the tears that streamed down Rebecca’s pale, sunken cheeks. “What do you want from me?”
“Do you have any idea what I’ve been through these last seven years? Thinking you were dead.” Her hand was shaking now, and the little laser gun wavered.
Katherine eyed Rebecca’s untrained finger wrapped around the welding torch’s trigger. She couldn’t be certain if there was enough distance between them that the laser cutter wouldn’t still be fatal. Katherine was fast, but she wasn’t fast enough to get back on her feet and rush Rebecca before a hole was burned in her sternum.
“So put the gun down and tell me.”
An unhinged sound escaped Rebecca. “Why? So you can shoot me? So you can turn off the environmental systems in my pod, just like Captain Dags’? Fuck you, Kat!”
In the quietest voice Katherine could manage, she said, “If I wanted you dead, Becky, you’d already be dead.”
“Don’t call me Becky!” Rebecca shrieked. “You don’t get to call me that ever again!”
Katherine stopped talking and felt very wise in doing that. Her mental health training was grossly rusty, considering the days of actually talking down the crazies were long behind her. These days, she either killed or recruited them. Balancing them out for their own safety was a skill she had long abandoned.
And, when she was honest with herself, she knew she’d never really considered this scenario. She had hoped to never tell Rebecca her identity and avoid the entire conflict all together. Was she even planning to help Rebecca off the s
tation, or was she going to leave her here? She hadn’t even considered, honestly. Rebecca was the past. She was a tool to use to strike against the Corp. But that was before she stood in front of her, vulnerable and broken.
“What do you want me to say, Rebecca?”
*****
Rebecca’s heart pounded painfully in her chest. Part of her brain screamed that she needed to put down the damn laser gun before she hurt someone, but her pain and rage were in control. “What do I want you to say? What do I want you to say?” Her mind flooded with so many possibilities that she was unable to think of one specific thing. “Tell me, Kat, what do I want you to say?”
Kat’s voice was calm and soothing, the way she used to speak to Rebecca when they were still up way too late in bed, talking about whatever dreams or wishes they both had. The voice was sucking Rebecca into the sense of calm, too. Rebecca knew what Kat was doing, knew she was manipulating her all over again because that was what Kat did. And, yet, she did it because it worked.
“Rebecca, I think you want me to say I’m sorry. Here. Read this.” Kat slid her tablet across the floor’s carpet. It stopped halfway between them.
“What is it?” Rebecca’s arm ached as the adrenaline finally began to subside.
“Zain isn’t your friend or…whatever he’s pretending to be. He has been watching you. His orders are to either recruit you or eliminate you. Quietly.”
“That’s a lie,” Rebecca spat automatically. But her inner voice whispered that Zain was probably an even bigger dick than she’d admit to herself, so she reached down to pick up the tablet. Kat made no effort to move from the floor, so Rebecca moved to sit on a nearby sofa’s arm. She scanned the screen, flipping back and forth over the pages of data. Comparisons. Charts. Security reports. Her spending, accounts, freaking InComm and ExComm searches. “I don’t…I don’t understand what I’m looking…there’s a VA spying on me?”
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