“You want us to swing over and get you on the way up?”
Yes. Going back to the ship now sounded quite appealing. But there was still the matter of the missing men and the tracks Tick had been following before the shuttle crashed. Not to mention that the other shuttles would struggle to find a landing spot that didn’t involve smashing every branch in a tree on the way to the ground.
“Go up, drop off the sick, take care of everybody, and send a shuttle back down to pick us up at the temple in the morning. Send Bassman and Chen with spare parts. I’ll show them to the other shuttle. I expect it to be made operable again.”
“What temple, sir?” Striker asked.
“There’s a Buddhist monastery in those mountains. It’s on the map. Thomlin will know where it is.”
“You’re sure you’ll be all right down here in the storm?”
“We’re fine. Out.” Viktor faced the others. “Who’s up for a walk?”
Nobody groaned out loud, but the women’s shoulders all slumped. Even Hazel’s might have drifted downward a hair.
“Hand out the gum, Tick. Two miles, people, that’s it.”
* * *
If one more vine smacked Ankari in the face, she was going to let out a screech that would put those raptors to shame. With every step, her feet sank into the mud, and with every third one, she had to yank a stuck foot out of the mire. The caffeinated gum the tracker had shared had helped for the first hour of the march, but its effects had worn off, leaving nothing but weariness dragging down her limbs. Thorny branches clawed at her clothes, which were plastered to her body, the water adding at least ten pounds to their weight. She was still carrying two packs, because Lauren, despite the sergeant’s first-aid ministrations, could barely walk.
Ankari tripped over another root and only kept herself from sprawling by grabbing a branch. The branch turned out to have thorns that sliced into her soggy palms like barbed wire. She yanked her hand free, cutting skin in the process. She kept herself from whimpering—or screaming—barely. Mostly because she, once again, had no idea where she stood with Viktor and his team. At first, she had been relieved, almost delighted, to see him charging out of the jungle to demolish the other mercenaries. But watching him slit throats and shoot men with the chilling accuracy of a computer had reminded her how deadly he was—and how uncertain she was of how he would feel toward her group. Once again, she’d escaped—using the key she had plucked from his pocket—and this time, they had succeeded in stealing his shuttle... and crashing it. When she had stepped out of the trees, his stare hadn’t seemed angry—in fact, he had almost been gentle, but she didn’t want to make assumptions or mistake weariness for amiability.
“You all right?” Sergeant Hazel asked from behind her, touching her shoulder.
“Yes, sorry.”
It was at least the fifth time Ankari had apologized. Viktor and his tracker were up ahead, cutting a path through the jungle, and it wasn’t as if the group could have moved quickly under any circumstances, but she couldn’t help but feel her and her team’s clumsiness was slowing everyone down. Jamie and Lauren were just as tired as she, not to mention more badly wounded, and they kept giving her looks back over their shoulders, silently asking if they could sit down and mutiny. It was probably only the continuing screeches from the jungle that kept them moving. Nobody wanted to be left alone with those raptors roaming about. The creatures hadn’t ventured close and attacked again, but Ankari believed that had more to do with her well-armed escort than any lack of interest in munching on humans.
Ground down by the events of the night and the awful weather, Ankari didn’t notice at first when they turned onto an actual trail, one where the vines and branches had been cut back. It was still muddy, but it wasn’t as difficult to navigate.
Viktor put away his big knife and waited for the women to pass, then fell in beside his sergeant. It was the first time the route had been wide enough for anyone to walk side by side. Ankari kept her eyes focused on the ground ahead, but listened, hoping to hear something useful—or at least that their destination was close.
“Less than a mile to the temple,” Viktor said. “We spotted some fresh tracks though. We’re not the only ones headed that way.”
“Would the monks give refuge to mercenaries on the hunt?” Hazel asked.
“They’ll give refuge to anyone. They only ask you to leave if you’re fighting in the temple.” Viktor raised his voice. “Markovich, you want me to carry those packs for you?”
Ankari wasn’t expecting the offer, or for him to acknowledge her, and she managed to trip again, this time without the help of a root. She found her balance before planting her face in the mud, but Viktor caught her by the upper arm, too, making sure she would remain upright before releasing her.
“Thanks.” Ankari’s shoulders burned and her backed ached, so she would have loved to give him the packs, but she made herself offer a stoic, “I’m fine,” instead. All right, it might have sounded more long-suffering than stoic, but that was all she could manage.
“How come you never offer to carry my stuff, sir?” Hazel asked, amusement in her voice.
“You’re a highly trained soldier in superior physical shape. Also, you glared lasers at me the one time I opened a door for you.”
Hazel snorted. “I have no memory of that.”
“Any sign of anyone following us?” Viktor asked.
“Just the storm clouds.”
“They are persistent. Keep an eye out.”
“Yes, sir,” Hazel said.
Viktor jogged a couple of steps to walk beside Ankari. “Miss Markovich, I’d consider it a kindness if you’d tell me how you and my shuttle came to be down here on the moon. I’m quite certain I left you in the brig. Again.”
Ankari could feel his eyes upon her, but she stared at the muddy trail instead of meeting his gaze as she mulled over possible answers. He had asked quite politely, but would that politeness remain if she told the truth? At the moment, he might think some of those thugs had kidnapped her from the brig. But if she lied and was later caught—there had to be video coverage of what had been happening on the ship—then she would only be delaying his ire.
“Someone was attacking your ship, and when the power went out in the brig, we let ourselves out,” Ankari said.
“The power went out?” Viktor looked back at Hazel.
“Just for a few seconds. Some men in black were waiting in the hallway, and we figured they’d come to get us, but we delayed them briefly, and then your people charged through, mowing them down. After that, they forgot to come in and check on us—there were still some other intruders on your ship—so we let ourselves out of there too. There was another fight at the shuttle bay, but we were hiding in the ladder well, so didn’t see any of that firsthand. Afterward, we slipped inside and invited ourselves onto the conveniently unguarded shuttle. Jamie closed the door, and we had plans to find ourselves a nice city down here to disappear into. But there was some device attached under the control panel—Jamie could tell you more about that—and it caused the shuttle to be on autopilot. It was determined to come down here. We tore out the device, but too late to do anything. The storm hit us hard, and we couldn’t find a spot to land, not that we had the control to manage to land anyway.”
She sneaked a glance at him, wondering how he felt about all this news, and the revelation that her team had been responsible for crashing his shuttle. She refused to feel that bad, considering he had destroyed her own ship, but she found herself reluctant to say things that would anger him.
It might have been the shadows, but his face was hard to read.
“We got a glimpse of the ship attacking yours as we were flying away,” Ankari added. Maybe he would be interested in that and would forget about the shuttle. “It was disk-shaped. It didn’t seem big enough to seriously damage your ship. More like it was trying to distract them so the shuttle could escape.” She decided not to mention the part where they had realized the
y had walked into a trap. He would connect the dots by himself, anyway.
“Did the boarding party come in through an airlock?” Hazel asked. “Or up in the shuttle from the moon?”
Ankari shrugged, though she belatedly realized the sergeant was talking to Viktor.
“Garland would have had all of Bravo squad standing next to that airlock if a ship tried to attach or send people over in suits. They must have come in the shuttle. With someone there to guide them in and talk to Garland, make him think there was no trouble.” Viktor’s voice had grown soft, dangerous. Ankari wouldn’t have wanted to be the “someone” who had helped the other side. “Markovich said someone—Tank, probably—was in the shuttle and had already been killed.”
“So he betrayed us, then was betrayed himself?” Hazel asked. “What happened to Rawlings then?”
“I don’t know.” Viktor touched Ankari’s arm. “Did you see a runty fellow with shifty eyes and a missing finger at any point?”
“I only saw the bald one and the people in black, but we were hiding from everybody. Also, most of the men we had time to take a good look at were dead, thanks to your men.”
“All right. I’ll have to wait for morning to get the full report, unless the temple has a decent comm station. Looks like you were coming down here one way or another tonight, Markovich.”
Ankari nodded glumly. “Given what we experienced in our five minutes of shared company with those people, I think I’m glad we took the route we did.”
Viktor looked toward Lauren and Jamie. “Jarlboro’s outfit always had a less than savory reputation.”
“Guess your Striker should have joined them then.”
Viktor looked down at her, a hint of sadness in his eyes. “Perhaps so,” he murmured.
Belatedly, Ankari got the impression he had been hoping she would point out that his outfit was more... savory. And she wished she had caught that before she’d spoken flippantly. She didn’t know what her status was with him, but he and his team had cut their way through the jungle and risked their lives against those other mercenaries to save the lives of her and her partners. Sure, they might have been protecting their investment, but the result was that Ankari and the others weren’t being mauled by horny brutes who couldn’t even keep their hands to themselves in the pouring rain in the middle of a predator-filled jungle.
“I’d rather be completely free and not anybody’s prisoner, but I appreciate that we’re not with them now,” Ankari said. She couldn’t quite manage a thanks-for-saving-us-Viktor. “I also appreciate that you haven’t thrown us up against the trees and beaten us senseless for escaping and crashing your shuttle.”
“Well, it looked like that had already been done.”
Ankari grunted. That was the truth. She wondered how bad she looked. Bad enough that he wouldn’t want to strip her out of her soggy jumpsuit and engage in another round of kissing, she assumed. Which was, of course, fine with her, especially if he was just protecting his investment out here. He might be polite about it, but in the end, she was still his prisoner. Still, he’d been furious at Felgard when she had shared Fumio’s letter with him. Maybe there was some chance she might convince him that she could make a better offer. She just had to figure out how to do that. Two hundred thousand aurums. She’d never come close to earning that kind of revenue from any of her companies, unless one counted gross sales, and she didn’t. Gross sales couldn’t pay off a mercenary.
“Sir?” Tick stopped and raised his hand.
The wide trail had turned into a road, and the foliage opened up ahead. The towering mountains had come into view, rising sharply with little in the way of foothills to ease the climb. The rocky spurs and cliffs were made of a dark stone that didn’t support many trees or other shrubbery. If not for a pair of lights part way up a steep slope, Ankari would have missed the temple; its outer walls were made from the same dark rock as its surroundings. The ground had been cleared around the base of the mountain, including a broad cement landing pad kept clean of encroaching foliage. She wasn’t sure how they would climb the steep hill to get to the temple, but the idea of getting out of the rain was nearly enough to send her sprinting ahead of the group to try.
“Trouble?” Viktor asked when the rest of the group caught up with the tracker.
Tick handed him a compact pair of binoculars. “Hard to say. The doors in the wall are open though. Like someone might have just gone inside. Or like they’re expecting guests for some reason.” He lifted his eyes toward the black sky. Yes, this wasn’t exactly good weather for visiting. Neither flying nor walking had proven healthy.
After a moment, Viktor lowered the binoculars and looked back at his bedraggled group. “You want to stay here while Tick and I have a look?”
He was probably talking mostly to Sergeant Hazel, but Ankari heard herself saying, “No,” before she could think better of it. She held out her hand, grimacing at the rain spattering her waterlogged skin. The screeches hadn’t sounded for the last few minutes, but she was willing to risk the temple, even if they had to fight another battle before a dry spot might be found.
“Hazel?” Viktor asked.
“I’d rather stay together, sir,” she said.
Viktor must not have had a strong opinion either way, because he shrugged and waved for them to follow him when he strode into the open. Both he and Tick kept their rifles at hand and watched all around them. There weren’t any craft sitting on the landing pad, nor was there any sign of life, apart from the two lights.
From a distance, Ankari hadn’t been able to see the road crisscrossing the steep slope in switchbacks, but it led them up the hillside, closer and closer to the temple. The structure itself was mostly guarded from view by the surrounding wall, but a few rooftops were visible, and she had the impression of different tiers of buildings, each nestled onto ledges and built right up against the cliff. Her legs soon burned from the climb, and her interest in the architecture waned. She decided to let the men remain vigilant while she fantasized about dropping her packs and changing her clothing. Maybe finding a bed. Some blankets. Sleep.
The animal noises of the jungle faded until only the sound of the rain remained, pounding down on the mountain. Lightning flashed, highlighting the backs of Tick and Viktor. Lauren and Jamie, too tired to speak, followed behind Ankari, and Hazel guarded their rear. Because she was right behind the two men, Ankari heard their murmured conversation.
“Should be a monk up there on night guard duty.” Viktor pointed to a tower poised on a corner that looked out over the jungle.
“You been here before, Cap’n?”
“Not this particular temple, but others. Most are laid out similarly. Similar protocols.”
“Like leaving the front door shut in a storm?”
“I’m not familiar with that one.”
The road ended at wide steps that climbed steeply straight up toward the door, which was propped open, with lanterns mounted on the wall on either side of it. Flame appeared to burn in the fixtures, fluctuating with the winds beating across the mountainside, and Ankari wondered if it was truly fire or some effect achieved with more modern technology. The place did look like an ancient habitat that could have predated the colonists who reached the galaxy fifteen hundred years earlier.
The thick wooden door proved more ajar than wide open, with a head-sized rock on the ground keeping it from banging shut. Rifle leading, Viktor stepped inside first. Nobody shouted or shot, and Tick went after him. Ankari stepped past the rock, keeping her back to the wall in the small, irregularly shaped courtyard that opened up. It was more like a walled balcony, rather than a courtyard, with the cliff rising on two sides and a building on the third, a simple rectangular structure, though a more interesting pagoda sat on the next section of the ledge, behind it. The only entrance to the temple appeared to be in the closest building.
While the rest of the group funneled in, Viktor and his tracker trotted around the courtyard, looking for signs of what, she coul
d only guess. A fight? The flagstone floor wouldn’t hold footprints.
When Hazel came in, she took up a position beside the door, so she could watch Viktor but also monitor the route behind them.
Lauren slumped against the wall, and Jamie crumpled to the ground beside her. Ankari stood next to them, not wanting to get in the mercenaries’ way.
“I’m so tired,” Jamie said, keeping her voice low. “And wet. I really hope we can rest here.”
“Is it horrible that I’m missing the brig on their ship?” Lauren asked, her eyes closed.
Ankari, taking her cues from the men, didn’t let herself relax beyond levering the packs off her shoulders. She wished she still had her pilfered laser pistol. Maybe she should have put up a fight when Hazel had taken it, arguing that she and her friends might help if there was another attack.
Viktor and Tick stopped to bend their heads over something near the front door. There weren’t any lights on in that first building. Viktor pushed open the front door without having to turn a knob or latch. It certainly hadn’t been locked. Maybe the structure had been abandoned.
The two men disappeared inside.
“Someone’s looking for Jarlboro,” Hazel said, gazing through the gap between the door and the wall.
“What?” Ankari stood on tiptoes to peer over her shoulder. “Oh.”
The running lights of a ship burned bright against the dark clouds. They outlined a disk-shaped vessel, one Ankari had seen before. “That’s the one that was attacking your ship.”
“Jarlboro’s Golden Coin. I wonder who’s going to inherit it.”
“Someone who plans to take it off to some planet with tropical islands with white beaches, while ignoring bounties, I hope.”
Mandrake Company- The Complete Series Page 16