A Big Ship at the Edge of the Universe

by Alex White

  She rolled off him and tried to help him up, but he refused. His leg wound had gotten worse with combat action.

  “I’m slow. Let me buy you some time,” he wheezed.

  She glanced down at the leg wound—bad, but not lethal; certainly painful. Then she thought of all the Fallen who were looking for a place to die. The captain had that look about him—of a man giving up, aching for some last-minute heroics. She could never stand men like that.

  Boots clocked him across the eyebrow so hard his head hit the deck, then hauled him to his feet. “Sorry, but if you’re going to check out …”

  “Do as I said, Boots!”

  She shoved him toward the far door. “Sorry, no. You’re relieved.” She jammed the switch and it hissed open.

  “On what grounds?”

  “Dereliction of duty,” she said, hauling him into the next corridor. Only a hundred meters to the main hangar deck where Aisha was. “You’re lucky I don’t execute you on the spot.”

  “I forgot what a pain in the ass you are,” he grunted, banging the button on the other side of the portal. “Hold up; I’m going to seal this.”

  Cordell summoned up his shield with a glyph and aligned it to the door. When he opened his hand, the shield rocketed outward and smashed into the thick bulkhead, denting it. It’d take explosives, magic, or a persistent technician to get through, and Boots figured their enemies had all three. Still, it might buy them a critical minute or two.

  “Not a lot of juice left,” he said. “Too tired.”

  “You’re just a bucket of complaints today.”

  They hobbled down the hallways together, not resting, and her heart skipped a beat as she spotted the bright lights of the hangar. Cordell slumped against her, even as she quickened her pace. His leg wound had opened up more in all the action, oozing a thick trail of red.

  “Almost there, Cordell. Just hang in there.”

  “Not going to call me Captain anymore?”

  “Got to earn that right, sir. You try to die, you ain’t my captain.”

  “All officers are worthless, Boots. Why’ve you got to pick on me?”

  “Because you’re better than an officer. You’re the bravest—”

  A flash of gray—Mother’s magic.

  Boots’s eyes scoured every shadow, searching for her. She remembered the knife appearing through Didier’s head, and checked Cordell to make sure he wasn’t dead in her arms.

  “Boots,” he wheezed, “was that what I think it was?”

  She hauled him forward. “She hasn’t reached us yet. Keep walking.”

  Their surroundings bled color, yellows shivering away, red warning lights melting into white. Mother’s spell closed around them, then subsequently broke, real-world hues socketing into the places they’d fled.

  Cordell craned his neck to look behind them. “What happened?”

  Boots smirked. “Just like I thought. She can’t drag me into her pocket dimension.”

  They were so close. Just a few more meters to the main hangar.

  “Uh, Bootsie …”

  They clumsily maneuvered themselves to look back down the corridor and saw Mother, her tattered cloak like fluttering ravens’ wings, her brass exoskeleton gleaming in the caution lights. Hundreds of tiny camera irises glittered on her helmet. In her right hand, she held the blade she’d used to end Didier’s life. Mother stared them down, waiting for their next move.

  “I can’t run,” whispered Cordell. “We’ve got to make a stand here.”

  She looked him over. “You’re not that heavy.”

  “You’re pushing fifty. You can’t lift my ass,” he hissed.

  “I’m in my early forties, asshole,” said Boots, then waved to the nightmare swordswoman down the hall. “Hey, Marlisa.”

  The figure in the distance cocked her head. Clearly, she wasn’t used to being called by her real name. Her claws clicked.

  Boots looked to the captain. Cordell’s grip tensed around his slinger. They couldn’t stay here. They had to get to the hangar, no matter what.

  Grace and power like a murderous cat filled Mother’s posture as she sank low and hurtled toward them. Boots spun and hoisted Cordell over one shoulder like an unruly child. Mother’s footfalls hammered the deck, drawing ever closer.

  “Go! Go! Go!” Cordell cried, his slinger sizzling spell after spell.

  Boots couldn’t take the time to look back. She didn’t want to look back. Her breath sprayed from her puffing cheeks in moist jets, and her heart thudded in her ears.

  Twenty meters.

  Cordell’s slinger clicked, and he ejected the magazine, spent crystals clattering to the ground. He made for the other on his belt, but lost his grip because of Boots’s unsteady gait. He snatched Boot’s slinger from her hand and resumed firing. Mother’s banging steps drew closer.

  Ten meters.

  The archway to the hangar loomed over her. If she could push a little harder, she’d make it. She’d seen so many corpses in her life—at Laconte, in the black skies over Arca, Didier—and always, Cordell had been there for her. She wouldn’t allow him to be taken, too. She’d nearly made it into the wide-open space when Mother slammed into the back of them like a meteorite.

  The tip of Mother’s sword slipped, white-hot, into Boots’s shoulder—the shoulder that bore Cordell. He yowled in pain as the assassin bowled into them, sending all three sprawling into the hangar. The captain skidded to a halt, limp. Boots couldn’t see his breath; there wasn’t time to watch the rise and fall.

  Mother kicked to her feet in a flash, bounding over to Boots with superhuman strength. She seized Boots about the collar, clicking her brass claws inches from Boots’s eyes.

  “How does it work?” hissed Mother, a hateful sneer white on her lips. “How do you subvert my spells?”

  With nothing to lose, Boots took a swing, her forearm crashing into Mother’s metallic block like punching a steel pipe. The crone shoved her back against the deck and stomped her fingers, smashing them under brass heels.

  “Arcana dystocia,” Boots growled through gritted teeth. “No magic.”

  Mother straightened, looming over her. “A dull-finger? What wonders. Did you know that you’re the first person to ever shoot me?”

  Somewhere in the rafters, a high-caliber slinger thundered, its potent round sparking against Mother’s head and yanking her neck backward. The crone hit the deck with a resounding thud, her hands twisted in agony. Her cloak drifted into place over her like the shadow of death.

  “Yeah? Well, Aisha is the second; she never misses,” coughed Boots, sitting up to inspect her fallen enemy.

  Mother twitched, a demolished face obscured by her cloak, her shattered helmet in bloody pieces across the floor. Boots had seen plenty of kills in her time, and she breathed a sigh of relief when she saw the death rattle reverberate through the crone’s frame.

  Boots called up to the rafters, “Hit her again, Aisha. I want to make sure this witch is dead.”

  She could scarcely make out the silhouette of her friend as Aisha cast her pale marksman’s sigil in the distance. One more perfectly placed head shot, and it would be case closed for the assassin. Boots lumbered to her feet and took a step back to give the woman some clearance.

  Mother’s legs and arms whipped her cloak into a frenzy of black tatters as she spun back to life. Her twisting movements brought her to her feet in a tilting leap, as though she could defy gravity through sheer martial prowess. And when the cloak blew aside, Mother seethed at Boots with bright red eyes. A bloody gash marred her temple, but no other serious injuries accompanied it. Boots jumped back as the crone spun once more, her hands whistling through the air.

  Except she hadn’t attempted to strike Boots—she’d thrown two grenades.

  Panicked, Boots glanced back at Aisha as a pair of explosions filled the rafters, ejecting the pilot from their embrace like a smoking comet. Aisha bounced off a wall before smashing into a tower of transit cases, which clattered down
around her. It’d been a high-speed, ten-meter drop—extremely bad. Boots couldn’t imagine her surviving, but that wasn’t the worst of her problems.

  Mother washed over Boots in a furious wave of painful blows. “You broke my helmet,” she said between punches.

  Bloody spittle issued from Boots’s lips as she staggered back. “You broke my planet.”

  Tears filled her eyes as Mother crushed her nose, then tore at her shoulder, ripping it out of socket. “Yes, and no one cared, did they? Did any planet send aid? Evacuate your people? Taitu wouldn’t even take your refugees. They were so tired of your squabbling, happy to let you starve out on that ball of sand.”

  Boots, though barely conscious, raised her one good arm to a fighting pose. She’d be surprised if she got to keep the other—now a horrifying mess of muscle and bone.

  “I think we can agree we did the universe a favor,” Mother grunted, sinking a foot into Boots’s gut like a sledgehammer.

  Ribs snapped and Boots went flying across the deck, lighting up with new pain. She forced herself onto her back and stared up at the assassin, unwilling to look away from the killer.

  Mother touched the back of a claw to her face, glaring at the blood that came away with it. The crimson syrup glimmered on brass, a regal color palette for a tyrant. In that frozen moment, Boots caught a glimpse of the woman Marlisa Gwerder had been: always cruel, never yielding.

  “Oh, but you are animals. Look at you: still glaring at me even though you’re bleeding out.” Her eagle’s gaze flitted to Cordell’s still body. “I want to show you … show you just how worthless you are. Would you like that?”

  Boots’s vision swam and lead filled her hands. Do it, then, witch. Show me what you’ve got, but hurry up.

  Mother creaked a smile. “I’m going to bring you your friends’ heads.”

  The assassin turned to Cordell, and her fingertips hissed as she traced her reality-bending glyph. She took it slow, each popping arc reaching a perfect completion.

  Colors shimmered and split into prismatic bursts. Mother vanished into her pocket dimension with Cordell.

  The indolence gas grenade on Cordell’s belt exploded into pearlescent smoke. Mother stumbled out of the cloud, choking and wheezing, her already pallid complexion growing blue as she fell to her knees with a clang.

  Boots rolled onto the side with her good arm and tried to stand. Her blood slicked the floor under her. First, she got one knee under her, then a foot. She rose, every nerve in her body crying out. Her feet threatened to leave her, but she widened her eyes, taking deep breaths.

  “If … it was just the suit,” Boots growled, staggering toward her opponent, “keeping you alive … that would be one thing. A sealed battery won’t fall to indolence gas. But I had this thought: What if you had another spell on you?” She tapped her temple. “If I was wrong, you could easily walk over here and kill me. But if I was right …”

  Mother squirmed away from the gas, spasming onto her back as her suit failed her.

  “What did you need godlike magic for? Because that was the haul you took from my homeworld: all our lives for magic.” Another step. “The suit was only to keep you mobile, wasn’t it? The godlike magic … that was to keep your failing body alive.”

  She arrived at her destination: Mother, twitching in terror. The crone raised a hand, and Boots found the strength to kick it away. Mother already looked so much older than she had moments before.

  “Don’t beg. Let’s keep our dignity, Marlisa. After all, your spell will come back when the gas wears off.”

  With all of her balance, Boots placed the tip of her shoe over Mother’s throat and pressed down. The crone struggled against her, but the exosuit lacked the coordination required to knock her off. Boots leaned into it, feeling the meaty crackle of Mother’s neck underneath her foot. Boots wouldn’t be able to stand much longer. She pulled back and dropped a knee onto the crone’s face.

  Mother twitched, and then was silent.

  Boots crawled off the body, balancing as well as she could on shaky hands and knees. Her comm chimed.

  Orna came in loud and breathy. “I got it! Kin is in control of the ship, but you have to get down here! Nilah won’t stop bleeding and we’re pinned do—”

  “Lizzie,” said Kin, cutting through Orna’s communication. His voice was like a blanket: all-encompassing, warm. “Are you conscious?”

  “Yeah.” Though she sounded distant to her own ears.

  “I’ve been able to seal most of the bulkheads containing Mother’s battlegroup.”

  “Good.” She blinked hard. “Scrub the mutineers’ code from your memory banks.”

  “I’ve already done that.”

  “Got any neurotoxin left?”

  “Two thirds of the supply.”

  Her body was too heavy; she couldn’t hold herself up anymore and sank down onto her ruined shoulder. “Spray it into every room containing the attackers, give them one minute, then vent the toxins into space.”

  “That’s feasible, but I need to get medical robots to you, Cordell, Aisha, and Nilah. Sealing the corridors will impede those first responders. Springflies would be more—”

  “Kill every last bastard in the docking bays with the autoturrets.”

  “You might damage the docking bays or the Capricious.”

  “Then I want you to jump the ship over the Taitutian capital and start … broadcasting everything.” Darkness loomed at the edges of her vision. “Across all frequencies and the Link … I want—I want everyone to know what we know.”

  “They’ll shoot us down.”

  “God, I hope so. No one needs a ship like this, Kin.”

  “What about Orna and Armin? They’re not critically injured, and jumping will place them in danger.”

  An eerie stillness fell over the hangar, save for Boots’s ragged breathing.

  “They’ll want to get the truth out there. Execute, Kin.”

  The ship thrummed with the sounds of autoturrets spinning up along its bays, reverberating through the hulls. The Harrow rocked with explosions. Though the gravity never failed, Boots could feel he was listing to one side. Blood pooled under her cheek as she closed her eyes. She could finally sleep.

  “Severe damage to aft impulse thrusters … severe damage to docking bay three … docking bay four … injecting neurotoxin on decks one through six …”

  She tried to grumble, but it only came out slurred. “Shut off the warnings, Kin.”

  “I’m sorry … if you don’t wake up, Lizzie, I want you to know that I love you in all the ways you organics value.”

  “Good night, Kin.”

  “Good night, Lizzie.”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Exfiltration

  Pain.

  Agonizing explosions across her body. Each moment, another mortar slammed down into a random patch of sinew and bone.

  Boots couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t move more than an inch, and managed that meager effort with shaking muscles.

  Piercing beeps. Burning, chemical stenches suffused her, catching in her throat to haunt her lungs. Her breath came in rotted gasps, as though something had died in her mouth.

  Then came the nausea—the worst she’d ever felt, like the world pitched her from icy water into baking desert, her head spinning all the way.

  Then oily relaxation crept through her body, pushing up through her limbs until all light winked out.

  Swear words gurgled from Boots’s mouth before full consciousness returned. Coppery syrup coated the inside of her cheeks, and she grimaced. Opening her eyes brought only blurry shades of white, gray, and blue, along with sluggish movements. She rolled on her cot and spat over the side before attempting to sit up.

  Big mistake.

  She cried out like someone had just taken a hammer to each of her bones. Her left arm throbbed so hard she thought it might rupture.

  Then came the deep laughter of a man. Slow and hoarse at first, gaining speed and clarity with each p
uff of air.

  “I knew your ass was going to make it,” Cordell croaked from somewhere in the room. “Unkillable.”

  “Rather be dead than wake to your ugly mug.”

  “Good evening, Lizzie,” came Kin’s voice. “Would you like to know the current time?”

  “Nah,” she replied. “Doesn’t much matter. Did we make it to Taitu? Did we broadcast the records?”

  “Not yet,” said Kin. “We’re in transit. I haven’t yet sent out the data, since we haven’t arrived.”

  She made to rub her eyes to get the gunk out of them, but her left arm wouldn’t move and violently protested the idea. She remembered Mother taking a chunk of her shoulder, the feeling of those brass claws inside her. She’d started feeling sorry for herself when she remembered crushing Mother’s throat.

  “Can I ask what shape I’m in?” she asked.

  “You’re alive,” he replied.

  “I’ll take it,” said Boots. “We’re still in trouble?”

  “Sort of,” said Cordell. “All of the people hunting us are dead, and we’ve got a shiny warship, but I don’t feel like that’s going to last.”

  Boots’s bed gently pressed on her back, sitting her upright in agonizing increments. A medical bot came by and helped her wash her eyes so she could take in the sorry sight of her crewmates. The med bay of the Harrow came into focus—thirty cots in rows of five, the ceiling above screened to look like a summer night in Taitu’s greenbelt countryside. To her right, Aisha lay sleeping, burn scars covering one of her cheeks and a healing splint glimmering blue around her neck. Her head had been shaved—she must’ve been resuscitated after her fall.

  Nilah lay unconscious on the cot behind her, bloody bandages across her forehead, ear, chest, arm, and hands. Tubes pumped artificial blood into her from a series of yellow tanks, and though her monitored vitals looked weak, they were stable. She’d need a day or two to recover.

  Malik rested peacefully beside Aisha, and Boots could’ve sworn he was just sleeping as usual. She would’ve thought the Harrow’s advanced med bay would be enough to rouse him to consciousness, but it was only enough to prolong his comatose life.