The Snare (Huntress of the Star Empire Episodes 4-6)

by Athena Grayson

  Ahveen’s claws moved over the padd and her features shifted into a frown. If she’d lifted her head, she’d have frightened the large clump of displaced citizenry milling in the main area of the terminal. Their status was evident from the basic-issue coveralls and identical luggage that held all they were permitted to keep during re-education. But even moreso, their bewildered faces gave them away. Had any of them looked up, their faces, with their heads full of New Morality platitudes, would have shifted into fear of the scary-looking demon woman. Xenna wondered how many of them had once worked and lived alongside Vultrons or Hathori. Now how many of them now fear us?

  Ahveen’s eyes, when she held the padd out to Xenna, held that much fear. “What?” The opportunities for flaws in the plan were many and varied, and she was only now beginning to truly understand what a long shot it was. And for what? Information. Not even a strike at the heart of the Union. She glanced down at the padd and saw what gave Ahveen pause.

  She skimmed over the official-channel communications, ignoring the Jump delays rippling from the inner orbits out to mid-system, but paused at the bulletin coming up on the Undernet. “Oh.” The blood drained from her face. The image was blurry, but Micah’s features were unmistakable, pulled from the Tenraye spaceport security feed. The picture of Treska Sivekka was cribbed straight off her government ID. “Look at all those zeroes.”

  “The penalty for interfering with a Vice Hunter is steep.”

  “Not steep enough. A bounty that high might have the Restoration thinking of taking a shot.” She met Ahveen’s eyes. “Watch your back, my friend.”

  “Neither the Prime Minister nor Special Affairs will deal with pirates. It’s against the New Morality code.” Ahveen spoke the words, Xenna knew, to soothe her.

  Xenna shook her head. “I haven’t met a power structure yet with true believers at the highest levels.” The Hathori priesthood’s structure acknowledged this and separated those with spiritual calling from those with the ability to run temples. “They want Micah bad enough, they’ll deal with anybody.” She tapped the screen again. “Our only wild card is the Huntress. How badly do they want their Vice Hunter alive?”

  “Let us discover that by being the ones with whom they must bargain.” Ahveen rubbed her sinewy arms. Xenna joined her in the action, smoothing the velvety charcoal down that covered her skin. Her cloak’s pheromone neutralizers couldn’t let her use her natural abilities to calm her Vultron friend, but that didn’t stop her from recognizing Ahveen’s nervous gesture.

  “We have no way of knowing where the Huntress is, or when she’s coming in, now.” Xenna’s mouth tightened again. “Somebody better get on that.”

  “We must explore her possible Jumps in the Delta Rose. You will not have to part with her after all.”

  “I can’t.” Xenna spared a thought for her spaceworthy paramour. “We still don’t know the full capability of that ship.” Or the Huntress herself. “If she makes it back to the Capitol, I can’t let them take Micah to prison. I’ll make my way from here to the Capitol, and be ready just in case.”

  “Do you trust your contact in the detention center?” Ahveen asked. “I know it is distasteful, but we must not discount the possibility that your jest about the Restoration may turn out to be true.”

  “I don’t trust my contact in the least,” Xenna said. “That’s why I pay him well.” She felt herself hardening, her senses sharpening and the softer side of the goddess within her and all Hathori receding to make way for the passion of her vengeful side. “I’ll reach out to the Hathori web.”

  Ahveen’s velvety ashen skin held the faint scent of spices her people used in their native cooking, and the affection they’d shared during the voyage here. Her strong, leanly-muscled limbs tightened around Xenna before she released her and stared down into her face. “I promise you, my friend.” She pulled a bead out of one of her dreadlocks and offered the tiny, electrum-plated object to Xenna. “I will keep the Delta Rose safe.”

  Xenna closed her fist around the bead, then drew the veil over her head and the lower half of her face as she parted company with her friend and joined in with the crowd moving towards the public transport terminals and the checkpoint that would allow them through Customs into the Capitol. The veil’s lightweight fabric was unadorned, save for a ribbon along the edge woven with magna-mesh that kept the veil from slipping and provided a modicum of privacy for the wearer against casual scans. Nothing government-issue, though—she was as exposed as any other sent as she moved through the line at Security and Interdicted Goods. She filed into the alien immigration line with Treemians, Vultrons, and a family of Riktorians committing the Riktorian taboo of going legit. Her plain robe, infused with pheromone neutralizers, offered her no more protection from the Customs scanners than if she’d strolled naked through them.

  Fortunately, her forgeries were iron-clad and radiation-shielded. She’d rather have strolled naked through the scanners and saved herself the trouble while giving the security forces something to talk about. Her skin was much more tantalizing than the drab shades of her clothing. She hid her smile behind the veil as she met the eyes of the security guard, who recognized her species and blushed. Not today, my dear. She wished she dared more ornament on the garb that she was required to wear in public, but anything fancier than the plain and soberly-colored ensemble would invite comment and for once, Xenna didn’t want to cause a riot with her presence.

  At least, not yet.

  Traveling With Baggage

  Something smelled tantalizing. Treska went from insensate blackness to the gradual realization that the warmth that bathed her was probably not the gentle heat of the Jewel shining in the sky, and the tempting scent might very well be sweet-smelling poison from burning chemicals. She opened her eyes to see the cracked egg of the piloting cowl above her.

  The HUD still flickered intermittent signs of life. The cabin was still pressurized, though it wouldn’t hurt to crack the hatch and not waste the atmosphere. “Run full systems diagnostic.”

  The audio feedback was a little shaky, but the HUD registered acknowledgment. She pushed the broken cowl off the piloting couch and disentangled herself from the synaptic feedback cabling. The cabin tilted at a crazy angle and she fell, more than climbed, out of the couch.

  Aside from the HUD chimes as diagnostics activated and ran, nothing but the tick-tick of cooling metal remained. She lurched uphill to get to the conventional console in the cockpit. Auxiliary power still seemed to function and the viewscreen flickered to life, illuminating a skewed-perspective landscape of rocky scrub and stunted trees. The ripples of the landscape she’d spotted from the air turned out to be foothills leading to a mountain range that snaked away into the distance and stood between them and the settlement she’d also glimpsed.

  She let go of the back of the Nav station chair and slid down the floor to the hatch leading to the main cabin. She opened it to find smoke filling the air and her psypath loose from his moorings. She searched frantically, aware that the smoke could hide him from her until he struck her down, no mental powers necessary.

  The thunk of a falling panel knocked her off balance and she slid past the galley. Her hands scrabbled for purchase on the deckplates and slid through something slick and wet.

  Blood.

  A lot of blood.

  “Psypath?” No answer. “Psypath!” Only sparks, and the smooth hiss of fire suppression greeted her. “Micah?”

  The tabletop had come partly loose from the wall and bent back on its mounting bracket. Underneath it, she could see cloth. She pried the metal surface up, throwing her whole body weight into bending it back to its original angle. “Micah!” She pulled handfuls of his clothes away to reveal his face. He was unconscious, a long gash running down the side of his face. The collar forced his neck into a weird angle, but he was breathing shallowly.

  She wiped the blood away. Most of it was superficial. “Micah. Can you hear me?” She shook him carefully. There was a diagnosti
c scanner in the medical triage kit, but the wall on which it was mounted had become ceiling from where they rested, so she had to settle for field training. Her hands roved over his body, checking for other wounds, broken bones, unusual swellings, and the like.

  She shoved his tunic aside and found bruising on his ribs. She moved down to his hips. His knees were bent and to the side and she moved her fingers over his legs and his rear end on first the top leg, then the bottom. She was reaching around to check his other hip when he moved suddenly and her hand brushed an…unusual swelling.

  She jerked her hand back and fumbled in her jacket for the remote that demagnetized the cuffs. The moment she did, he turned his body and groaned.

  “Micah?”

  His eyes fluttered open. One was bloodshot and the other refused to dilate. “You came back for me.”

  She frowned. “Of course.” Concussion, no doubt.

  “Missed you, m’zara.”

  “What?” She was still trying to figure out what a m’zara was when he pulled her against him and kissed her.

  Her body stiffened in surprise, before sudden heat seared through her. Her mouth softened, her body relaxed, and tingles raced through her. She kissed him back, wondering at the joy that could come from a simple brushing of sensitive lips against another’s. Every taste lit off little fireworks in her extremities that sent pressure pulses to her center, where they gathered in a tension coil that wound tighter with every passing second until—

  VICE CREATES DANGER! VIRTUE IS PROTECTION! AUSTERITY IS THE PATH TO SECURITY!

  “Auughh!” She jerked back and clapped her hands over her ears. Not now! She shouted the mantra of austerity as the Voice took over.

  She came back to herself with her fingers cramped and Micah unconscious next to her. Sweat soaked through her shirt and the air felt close and damp. She sent a dirty look towards the sleeping form of the psypath. His neuro-collar twinkled green and the gash had begun to scab over, except for the top, where it was deepest. She fought for purchase over the tilted landscape of the cabin, using the sides of storage lockers to climb up to the survival gear. Even with caution, she lost her grip on the locker door, and the contents clattered to the floor. Or rather, the other wall.

  A heavy ration pack landed on Micah’s stomach. “Oof!” He grunted and flung the pack off, cracking one eye open in the process. “Let’s not play, darling. I need a cuddle.”

  Was he kidding? She frowned and clambered back down to his position. Through dried and cracked lips, she called out for a repair status update.

  “Systems holding at thirty-two percent.”

  “Holding?”

  “Hold me, my love,” Micah murmured. She scowled at him and edged away. Clearly, his head injury was more severe than she first thought. Or his sanity was more fragile. Either way, she couldn’t risk another incapacitation by the Voice, and that meant avoiding any triggers. Instead, she distanced herself with applying first aid. Antiseptic, syntha-skin, treatment cream—she squinted at his midsection bruising, then poked him near the swelling. “Does that hurt?”

  His eyes fluttered open. For a moment, she thought he might be lucid, the way his steady, burning gaze bored into her. “You are a wound in my heart I’ve grown used to.”

  So…obviously not a critical injury. “What do you mean, repairs are holding?” She addressed the comm system while she cleaned him up and bandaged the bleeding. The best she could do for his head was attach a general-use medi-monitor to his forehead and let it process.

  “Critical repairs unable to proceed without Nitradix Stardrive Systems part 227-22804HG Actuator, Crystal Nitride Solution Treated. Please replace or repair manually before automated repairs can resume.”

  “Really? Really?” Micah’s hand, heavy in the repulsor cuff, had curled back around her thigh. She shoved him off and struggled to her feet again. “Fine. Work on something else, then. Route repairs around Actuator, Crystal whatever-whatever.”

  The planet—Guerre—wasn’t exactly a vacation destination. Once Treska finally got the hatch open, she emerged into dry, dusty air. She inhaled, and regretted it immediately. It wasn’t the pollen-rich, fertile warmth of Tenraye. This dust tasted sharp.

  She pushed herself up and out of the hatch, then crawled down the side edge of the ship until she found the lowest point, then dropped to the ground.

  Her landing was not graceful. She crumpled and rolled and heard a crunch when the impact traveled up her arm. She rolled to a hard stop with a rock digging into her shoulder. She lifted her arm and checked her wrist-mount. “Shit.” The dent in the cartridge told her she had two good shots left.

  She pushed to her feet and assessed the damage from the outside. Her poor Needle’s Eye! The sleek lines of the craft were scored with laser burns, and crusted with dust. Behind them, a five-kilometer long scar bore evidence of their angle of descent through the scrubland. Ahead, the dust cloud kicked up by her crash drifted as a spot of haze against the purpling mountains. That thing can be seen from space. That means we can be seen from space. If the Riktorians somehow managed to figure out where she’d Jumped to—and hadn’t assumed she turned herself into spacedust making an unscheduled Jump—that gash might as well be an arrow that said, ‘Target Here.’

  She pulled a padd out of her backpack and checked the repairs. She spared a moment of concern for Micah, but the readout sent to her padd from the medi-monitor reported that he was stable. He was safe in the ship, if a little uncomfortable, and she couldn’t do anything about his scrambled brains right now. What she could do was erase the evidence of their crash-landing before the Riktorians—or anything else with hostile intentions—discovered them and made things more complicated than they needed to be.

  She paused to climb back into the ship and check on Micah about two hours into her efforts. He slept fitfully, curled into an awkward position, but at least the ship had aired out.

  With life support powered down, the repairs had progressed. Green nano-composite gel leaked from the space behind the panels, oozing over the conduits. The gel would repair the physical connections and re-form the electrical pathways of the ship’s systems, and eventually evaporate when it was no longer needed. Until then, however, it oozed over everything. She opened the bent door of her medication locker and looked at the tubes of inhibs with dismay.

  Most had been crushed, the back row had been on fire, probably for quite some time, given the way their metal tubes had fused, and the remaining inhibs were melted into the gel. All she had left were the ones in her belt.

  She forced herself to stay calm. Lack of inhibs wouldn’t kill her. But the medical center was pretty adamant about her need to take them. Your body is a finely honed tool, and without the exact mix of nutrients and chemicals, you will lose that edge. Your systems may begin to reject the enhancements that make you exceptional.

  All the more reason to get the hell off this rock and back on course to the Capitol.

  She used some precious auxiliary power to transmit a slow-delivery, narrow-band encoded message to Special Affairs with a brief status report, then packed planetary survival gear into two packs that she hauled outside. Their best bet for survival would be to make way to the settlement over the mountains. In the map information, she’d discovered a geological survey that revealed the mountains were full of navigable caves left over from old crystal mines. As long as she paid attention and moved carefully, they should be able to make it through the caves in a long day’s journey on foot, provided Micah could keep up.

  She glanced over at her prisoner and fellow survivor. Micah was still blissfully unaware, but the repair gel’s inexorable march would carry it over him soon, and she didn’t want the gel to waste its time trying to repair him instead of the ship. Since he was already unconscious, he wasn’t party to the indignities she forced upon him via the repulsor cuffs as she used their magnetization to “climb” him up the bulkhead to the hatch. He hung, unconscious and occasionally upside-down, his loose clothes falling wh
erever gravity pulled them. She avoided looking at his body, except to note bruises. Didn’t at all notice the lean cut of his hips, or the definition in his shoulders, or the way the lines of him, stretched out facedown and halfway out of the hatch as if he’d fallen into a nap there, reminded her of a shape she’d seen before. But she couldn’t recall any instance of any of her fellow trainees or squad members wounded or napping this way. None of whom she’d been so consciously aware.

  She wrestled his inert body down the smooth outer hull, sliding on her rear end, using her legs, grabbing fistfuls of his clothing, until they landed in an undignified heap on the dusty ground.

  She roused him for water and had to work at it. In his groggy state, he pawed weakly at the collar, and she almost—almost—coded the release for it.

  Don’t be ridiculous! He’s a psypath. Set him free, and you shackle yourself. After what she’d put him through—the fate to which she was about to deliver him—no sane psypath would pass up the chance to exact revenge. He might not seem like it, at times downright cheerful in his resignation to his capture, but she couldn’t imagine any other outcome. Unlock that collar and he’ll steal your mind the way you stole his freedom.

  Had their roles been reversed, it was exactly as she would have done.

  She spent the next several hours moving brush over the gouge in the earth, and arranging more brush around the ship itself. Several times, she cut her hands on sharp leaves or tricky thorns, and she could’ve sworn the grit that blew into her eyes and filled the air was made of tiny blades.

  It was in the low, narrow tunnels, where his back ached dully and his thigh muscles burned from hunching over that Micah realized the walls were whispering to him.