by Zoey Indiana
Jingle Bell Vengeance
A Vengeance Holiday Story
Zoey Indiana
Jingle Bell Vengeance
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Copyright © 2019 By Zoey Indiana
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, please contact Zoey Indiana at [email protected].
Publisher's Note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
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Cover Art: EmCat Designs
Contents
Join Zoey’s Zine
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
A Note from the Author
Also by Zoey Indiana
About the Author
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To all the diverse individuals who walk through a less than perfect life and survive hard times, you are worthy. I appreciate all the hard work you’ve accomplished to be here and read my book.
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You are amazing, and don’t let anyone else tell you different.
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To all the amazing members of Colorado Romance Writers ~ Just remember this story is your fault. I’m looking at you Holly and Aidy =P
Chapter 1
Bash picked up a dusty dead tab and looked it over. "This thing is ancient, no wonder they had to abandon this place."
"Actually, that just shows how old this colony is. The Resistance abandoned it over 300 years ago." Freya walked back toward him from a small side room. Her vibrant purple eyes always stole his breath away. "I don't see any signs that anyone from either side has been here since. Did Nova say what led them to believe otherwise?"
"No, just an alarm was tripped, but not which one. She said it was reset almost immediately." He looked around the control room. Large display boxes lined up across the wall in front of them were narrow boxes that had letters on them just like is handheld did.
"But all the computers here appear to be dead." Freya pushed a button on a tall black box that had several lights that were out. "Nothing is responding."
"Maybe it's just supposed to appear that way, which would explain why Nova wanted me to come with." Scanning the room, he looked for the least likely place someone would search. A faint line in the black metal plated wall caught his eye. Walking over to it, he traced his fingers along the barely visible seam.
Applying pressure along all four corners, the last one let out a soft click. Pulling his hand away, the panel swung open and revealed a series of unlabeled buttons. A pattern of four by six identical buttons covered the hidden compartment and gave him no indication of which he should press.
Looking over his shoulder, he saw Freya's legs sticking out from underneath one of the control station looking things. He didn't want to bother her if she was onto something, besides, he should be able to figure this out. Leaning to one side, he examined the buttons from an angle, but none of them appeared more worn than the others.
With the slightest pressure, he tested each one, and they all gave way like real buttons. Pausing, he considered his options. This could go very good or bad. While he could wait for Freya to finish what she was doing and take a look, what were the chances of a self-destruct button in a panel like this. Weren't those supposed to be red anyway?
Refusing to wait any longer, he sang a kid's limerick as his finger passed over each of them. On the last word, he pressed the button he hovered and held his breath. Silence ticked by one nanosecond at a time but nothing happened. Examining the room, he didn't find a single thing changed.
Turning back to the panel, he sighed. One of these buttons had to do something. Starting at the top right, he pressed every single one as fast as he could. Still nothing happened.
Not a single light turned on nor did any of the machines start humming. He clicked the panel door closed on a sigh.
Defeated, he returned to Freya's side as she slid out from under the tall computer.
"Didn't find anything that appears disconnected. Maybe the power system went out." Freya stood and smacked dust off herself before continuing. "We should head back, chances are we won’t find anything here."
"It's a shame, I was kinda interested in what this place would look like." Bash paused as a small round disk sitting on a shelf caught his eye. "Wait, what's this?"
Freya joined him, picked it up and looked it over. "If I had to guess, it's a hologram memory disk. It's a fairly old technology, now outdated by our handhelds which can send and play holograms without them."
"How would we watch this?" He looked around for anything that appeared to take it.
"There's probably nothing worth watching on it. If I recall, it was the most common way Resistance leaders communicated. Probably hundreds of those lying around. If it was important, they would have secured it."
"Humor me."
"Fine." Freya looked around, then plucked a small circular box off the same shelf. Pressing a button on the side made a tiny door open, then she slid the disk inside, and set the box on a table. A light on the side of it flickered several times before an image of a woman projected into the middle of the room.
"If you're watching this, it means I failed in my mission." The translucent woman was dressed in an all black outfit, the quality of the image made it impossible for him to see any of the smaller details. The woman looked down at her hands for a long moment before looking up again. "Sometimes I wonder, was this worth it? Were all the deaths really necessary?" She sat on something that the recording machine didn't register and rested her face in her hands.
"Do you know who that is?" Bash whispered to Freya.
"Yes, everyone in the Resistance should. That's one of our founding leaders." Freya looked at him. "Why are you whispering, she can't hear you?"
"I don't know, it just seemed appropriate." He shrugged but didn't continue when the hologram leaned back, crossed her arms, and spoke.
"It's been fifty long years and more people than I can count have died from both sides. When the five of us started this movement, we never expected it to get this far. Honestly, I thought ARI would swoop in and kill us all, but we always stayed one step ahead of them. For every attack, the other retaliated. I wish-" The image flickered and disappeared.
"No!" Freya jumped forward and fidgeted with the hologram player, but the image didn't come back. "I have to see the rest!"
"I think it's damaged." Bash tried to pull it from her hands so he could look at it, but she yanked it away and dropped to her knees. This wasn't a normal reaction from her, a shiver ran through him at the fact she was showing so much emotion. "It's okay, we might be able to fix it."
She clutched it to her chest as tears rolled down her cheeks. He reached into his pocket and retrieved a handkerchief. Any minute now her emotion control chip would activate and cause pain to shoot throug
h her brain, triggering a nose bleed. Squatting down next to her, he held it out, but her attention never wavered from the hologram projector.
"Freya, you have to calm down, it's going to hit you hard." But her silent tears turned to heart-wrenching sobs at his words.
A drop of blood ran down her lip. Frantically looking around the room, he didn't see anything he could do to make her calm. On top of that, he wasn't even sure why she was crying. Clearly he was missing something. "We really need to take care of the chip."
"No, I'm not ready-" She lurched forward, one hand pressing against her head as blood ran from her nose.
"You may not be ready, but it's time. This thing is going to kill you if we don't do something about it." Tamping down his own frustration at her continued refusal, he couldn't help feeling like she was rejecting him. Some days he didn't know if they would last, but one of these days, he would destroy that chip, whether she approved. He tried to take the hologram from her, but she refused to let go. "I'll give it back, I want to see if I can fix it."
"Don't damage it more, this is important." She hissed out, but let him take the box from her.
Slipping it into a pocket, he leaned forward and scooped her into his arms. "Come on, let's get out of here, then we can try to fix this thing." He'd show her just how capable he was by fixing this hologram player, then maybe she would relent and let him disable her chip.
She relaxed into his chest before adding, "when the Resistance has the upper hand in this war, I'll consider messing with the chip. Until then I can't risk the weakness, you saw what emotions just made me do."
His heart hurt at her words. With a microcomputer inhibiting her emotions, could she ever really love him? Pushing the spiral of thoughts aside, he focused on not tripping over random debris as he carried her through the colony.
As they neared the exit, both of their handhelds chimed with an alert. Freya pulled hers out of her long vest and held it out so they could both read it. Instead a video played.
"All nearby colonies must go on lockdown. Crimson just infiltrated Gu'Shari Colony and I only have a few seconds before they break into this room. We have no idea how they found us, so be careful." The woman turned toward the door as pounding noises echoed through the broadcast. "I regret nothing. Stay strong my sisters!" The broadcast went dark.
"Put me down." Freya pushed on his chest. He hesitated but complied, gently setting her on the ground. "We have to get back or we'll be locked out. With Crimson on the hunt, you are the most valuable thing there is. We have to keep you safe."
She burst into a sprint and he followed after her cursing under his breath. Their footsteps pounded on the long metal grating that worked for a floor. The corridors were made of long pieces of scratched sheet metal riveted together. Bash came around a corner and saw Freya standing just inside the doorway. The rest of their team gathered at their transits, waiting for them to return from the investigation.
"There you are, let's go." Freya took a step forward then her body spasmed as alarms blared around them. He grabbed onto the tail of her vest and pulled her back. Kneeling next to her limp body, he pulled his handheld from a pocket and scanned her for life signs.
While a little sporadic, the results indicated she should be fine. Looking up, he didn't see what had shocked her. Grabbing a piece of debris, he threw it through the doorway and it got caught in an invisible electrical field. Damn, he'd turned on something earlier, and now they were stranded in a facility with a subpar security system while Crimson was on the hunt.
Chapter 2
After moving her further from the barrier, he'd found some tools and started working on the hologram projector while waiting for her to regain consciousness. Watching the woman's image appear and say the same thing over and over had left an eerie uneasiness in him. In the twenty minutes Freya was unconscious, he'd managed to get a little more of the message.
Bending a piece that had been broken, he tried to make it reach the trigger that kept causing the machine to fail. Satisfied with his work, he pieced the box back together, and let it play. This was another step to earning her trust. Soon she'd let him take a shot at her emotion chip. As the image spoke, he recited her words from memory until he got to the part he hadn't heard.
"Despite knowing that the traitor is one of my Resistance sisters, I still find myself questioning my own motives. Yes, just like the rest of us, I claim this is for the good of the people. That women have the right to live free, but sometimes I wonder if this is all for my own need for vengeance. My mother died at Is'Ora Prison because ARI claimed she wasn't loyal to the Sovereign. They could never provide proof of her so-called crimes but she was executed anyway."
The translucent image patted her thighs while she sat and looked around the room. "Did I start a war to save women from this dystopian government or did I use it as an excuse for revenge? I guess I'll never know."
She cleared her throat and continued. "The traitor inside this colony has set it up so I'll die on the mission today, and I'm not going to stop it. I've done horrible things in the name of freedom, so maybe I deserve to die. Even if I do live, something inside of me died today and I'll never be the same. This is Dari'ana signing out for the last time." She reached forward then the replay died.
"We all knew she'd been betrayed, but not who did it. And now we’ll never know." Freya's voice made him jump.
"You're awake?"
"I just came to as the hologram started playing." She pushed herself up into a sitting position against the wall and ran her fingers through her short black hair. "What happened?"
"I turned on the colony's security system but didn't realize it. I bet if we go back to the control room, it will be lit up." Grabbing the hologram projector, he switched it off and put it with the tools in his pocket. "I've looked all along this exit and can't find a way to turn off this barrier."
She went over to where she'd been shocked earlier, then looked all around before looking back at him. "What about your cloaking device, doesn't that work as a personal shield?"
"It does and would work great, except yours was fried earlier." He joined her at the edge.
"Then you go through."
"No, I'm not leaving you." He'd been waiting for this argument the moment he realized only one of them would get through. In her eyes, they would never be equals. "This is designed to work on one person. If I tried to carry you through, it would overpower it and we'd both end up unconscious. Alternatively, if I go through first, I can't throw it back to you so you can leave too, it can't shield itself. That means only one of us can leave and it won't be me."
"I'm not having this argument with you again." She growled as a piece of twisted metal flew through the air, stopping at the barrier. A sizzling noise echoed through the metal hallway as sparks appeared around it. After a few more seconds, it flew back in the direction it came from. "Dammit, not even my telekinesis works on it."
"Will your telepathy go through it? Since you set off the alarm, my handheld hasn't been able to connect to anything."
"That might work."
She waved at the rest of the team outside, and they walked over leaving plenty of room between them and the trap. Silence dragged out as all the women stood, but he took it as a sign it was working. He thought about trying to alter the cloaking device, but his confidence was shaken. Maybe it was a good thing she didn't trust him to take a shot at her chip.
"I sent them to go seek refuge at the nearest colony. Gu'Shari isn't that close to here, so let's hope Crimson doesn't decide to come this way. In the meantime, we have to figure out what is going on here. Dari'ana's message leads me to believe there is more to this story." Freya didn't wait for him, she just stomped off in the direction of the control room.
As he predicted, the viewing boxes were on, displaying various rotating camera feeds from inside and outside the colony. Returning to the panel from earlier, he still couldn't find any discernible difference in the buttons. Aside from turning everything back on, th
is panel couldn't have caused the malfunction in the security perimeter.
"Wait, you said your handheld wasn't communicating with anything since I triggered the alarm?" Freya's voice held an edge to it.
"Yes, I wasn't able to communicate with anyone outside of the colony."
"No, no, no, please tell me it didn't." She frantically dug out her device and pressed buttons. "Fuck!" Pulling her arm back, she started to throw the handheld but stopped herself at the last second. Instead she let out more curses and kicked a chair across the room.
"Freya?" His voice stopped her mid rampage.
"You have to leave, now. Don't argue, just go."
"Tell me what's happening." He took a step closer, but her hand shot up stopping him in his tracks.
"Whatever is happening disabled the program that scrambles my track chip."
"Shit, so they can track you here, and will do so because you're supposed to be in the inner-city right now." Bash's mind raced at the implications. Not only would Crimson be able to track them, she was broadcasting her location. "You have to let me alter your chip, it's the only chance we have."
"It doesn't matter, it's already pinged this location to my handler. Even if you disable it, they will still know where we are."
"Only if we stay here. Just give me one shot, if I can't do it…" He cringed as he forced the words out. “I’ll do what you want."
"You'll leave?" Freya looked him in the eyes.
"If the chip is too advanced for me to alter, I will leave this colony without you." Just saying the words felt like a betrayal of his heart.