by Cathryn Cade
Navos strode onto the command deck. The sleek command console framed a breathtaking view of deep black space, dotted with twinkling stars. Silhouetted against it, the tall-backed chairs around the command console held the crew commanders. They all wore the silver grey of the Orion, with commander epaulets over the symbols of their specialties.
However, gone was their usual bonhomie and good-natured ribbing. Even had Navos not been able to intuit the mood of his co-commanders, their faces and their silence would’ve told the story. He looked around the circle of chairs.
Halix, head of operations, his round lavender face solemn; Ogg, chief mechanic, his weathered human face furrowed with a scowl; Dr. Tentaclar, head medical officer, his eye stalks waving slowly; Panthar, the Tygean navigator, hunting-cat eyes narrowed dangerously; Mra, the Pangaean chief interpreter, her green corn-silk hair wrapped tightly about her throat in worry.
Standing with his hands braced on the console, face grim, Captain Craig looked up as Navos entered.
“Ah, Daron,” he said. “And here are Sirena and Slyde.”
Navos stopped by his chair as two stunningly attractive warriors glided in. Both wore golden-yellow guard uniforms, commander epaulets on their shoulders. Slyde Dragolin towered head and shoulders over his bride, but she moved with the utter self-confidence of one who wasn’t just lovely, but lethal.
Sirena smiled briefly at everyone, slipping into the chair Slyde held for her.
“Welcome back,” Craig said. “Sorry we had to interrupt your honeymoon.”
“You know we’d never stay away at a time like this,” Sirena reproved him.
“The Serpentian mountains will still be there after we have stopped these attacks once and for all,” her huge husband agreed in his deep, smoky voice. “If that’s what this was.”
“Yes,” the navigator agreed, leaning forward with his powerful fists clenched on the console. “This time we’ll find who’s behind these cowardly attacks. And I’ll personally rip them to shreds.” He flexed one big hand as if it sported the lethal claws that appeared in his Tyger mating shift.
Craig acknowledged their support with a nod. “You all know Commander Navos and his young colleague discovered and averted an attack. Unfortunately, they were forced to kill the attacker. Daron?”
“It was obvious the boy was under some great duress,” Navos told them. “He screamed in pain and despair even as he continued to bodily assault the reactor hatch.”
“Was he insane?” Sirena asked.
“He exhibited a normal profile at the time of boarding,” Navos answered. “But during the time of the attack—yes, he exhibited clear signs of manic hysteria.” He looked at the old physician. “Dr. Tentaclar? Mr. Halix found an implant of some sort on the body. What more did you discover during your autopsy?”
Tentaclar blinked several of his eyes. “A clever device, indeed. After considering the location in the brain, I consulted with colleagues at the Indigon University. My suspicions were correct. The device is one that can be attached to the cerebrum and used to control certain behaviors.”
“The boy had behavior problems?” Slyde asked.
“None that were logged with the InterGalactic Space Forces,” Halix assured them.
“Could he have been of, ah, a wealthy family that kept it quiet?”
“They could certainly have tried,” Halix said, “but I don’t think they could have succeeded to such an extent.”
“Hmm. I’m not so sure,” Sirena said, with a wry glance at her husband. “Some families have managed to keep secrets for centuries.”
Slyde Dragolin’s golden eyes gleamed. “There are ways to hide information,” he agreed.
Panthar rolled his eyes. “Yeah, if your family could manage to hide your little habit of shape-shifting into fire-breathing dragons, I reckon this boy’s family could hide a little mental shakiness.”
“But not from me,” cut in Navos, impatient with their byplay. They all turned to look at him. “Not from me. I repeat—the boy’s mind scan was normal when he boarded.”
Craig nodded decisively. “If you say so, Daron. So, if the boy wasn’t insane, what caused him to act as he did? He was out of control, to the point he caused himself serious injury battering at the hatch into the reactor. Why?”
“Perhaps he was not out of control,” said Tentaclar.
Navos froze as the doctor’s meaning thrust home like an icy spear. “You mean the device?”
Tentaclar nodded, blinking his several eyes. “I do. The device is meant to control and the boy behaved in a manner incongruent with his nature, therefore…”
“Therefore someone else was controlling him.” Anger and realization rolled up through him like a great physical force. Before he knew it, Navos was on his feet.
The command team gaped at him as one, apparently dumbfounded by his display of emotion. He stared into a vision that only he could see as his chair thudded against the bulkhead behind him. He saw faceless beings hovering behind the boy and they had one thing in common.
“Daron? What is it?” Captain Craig demanded.
Navos focused on his captain, the inner image burning in his mind. “The only beings in our galaxy capable of forcing that boy to behave in such a manner are…Indigons.”
“Great God beyond,” Craig said, obviously shaken. “You’re right. But…who?”
“There are other Indigons on the Orion,” Sirena said. “The girl—we’ll arrest her at once.”
Navos shook his head, waving away the suggestion. “No. It couldn’t have been the girl. She sensed the attack—was a conduit for the boy’s distress. I myself entered her mind—worked with her to stop him. If she’d caused it, I would have known.”
“Then who?” Sirena demanded. “Are we being shadowed by another ship?”
Craig shook his head, turning to stare out at the blackness of space. “We would’ve picked up another ship shadowing us. If we were hovering for takeoff or landing it could be done easily, but we’re traveling at star speed out here. We have other ships on our sat-com, but they’re all at normal traffic distance.”
“It’s the implanted device,” Navos said, his mind racing. “It has to be. Perhaps it was programmed in some way.”
“I will study it further.” Halix leaned forward, face grave under his dark bowl of hair. “Commander, I fear you’re right about the intent of the device. In studying the boy’s records, we discovered the surgery to implant it took place on Indigo.”
Navos stared at him, ice spreading through his chest until he was numb. “My home planet. So the conspiracy to destroy the Orion has spread even there.”
Craig surged out of his chair to face him across the command console. “You think this is the same group that has been targeting us?”
Sirena uncoiled from her chair as well, her lovely eyes narrowed. “Yesss! It follows the same pattern, using a dupe or a paid saboteur.”
“‘The most dangerous weapon of all is that which doesn’t know it is a weapon,’” Craig murmured.
Navos looked sharply at him. Craig nodded. “Yes, Daron, you said that. Little did you know you were predicting the quarking future.”
“Wait a minute,” snarled Panthar, rising as well. “Why bother with this surgery? Can’t you Indigons mess with other beings just with your minds?”
Navos bowed ironically. “As you say, but we must be within a fairly small radius. You might compare it to being within sight, or hearing distance. Whoever did this used the technology developed by psych-techs for the InterGalactic Space Forces. It’s commonly used on petty criminals to monitor and if necessary, modify their behavior.”
Panthar growled low in his throat. “Seven hells, that ruffles my fur the wrong way! They shouldn’t be able to do that to a guy.”
Sirena cast him a fiery look. “It’s intended for rapists and child molesters. They deserve whatever means are necessary. Commander Navos, you’re saying someone used this psych-tech implant to force the boy to attack a locked
cerametal hatch with his bare hands? With his body?”
Cold rage coalescing in his gut at the memory of the boy’s torn hands and face, Navos nodded shortly.
“That is truly evil!” Mra’s green hair waved about her throat, radiating distress instead of her usual serenity.
“So was the last plot against the Orion,” said Slyde, his golden eyes molten with remembered rage as he stood behind his wife. “When deadly serpents were loosed among us.”
“And the voyage before that, when two of our own were paid to sabotage us,” Sirena hissed.
“And our maiden voyage, when one of my countrymen smuggled a bio-bomb aboard,” Mra added sadly. “Captain, how much longer can we go on under siege?”
“We can’t,” their captain said starkly. He looked around at all of them. “We have to stop them now. It’s only a matter of time before they manage to do some real damage. Or until the news media get hold of the whole story. Many of the crew know. We can’t keep that many people quiet.”
“What do we know?” asked Slyde. “Anything new?”
“That is an interesting question,” chirped a new voice. The others looked at the doctor in surprise. Tentaclar aimed an eye at each of them, blinking solemnly. “What I know is this,” he said. “The Indigon boy had an implant in his brain. What interests me is—what I know.”
“What do you mean?” asked Craig impatiently.
“I mean, Captain, that I could have done that surgery. So could any competent surgeon on any number of planets. And, it could have been used on many races of beings. So why not?” He looked around at them all expectantly.
Navos stared at him, realization of the old doctor’s meaning streaking through him like an electric shock. “Why do the implant on an Indigon?” he echoed. “Why choose one of my race? Other beings are as susceptible to mind control, just not able to use it.”
Sirena drew in her breath in a hiss. “Yesss. Whoever did this must know you are on board the Orion. And how powerful you are at divining any threat. Why do they dare to do this here?”
Panthar let out a low mrrrowl of realization. “Yeah, they must know how angry it would make you for an Indigon to be victimized. Seven hells, if they messed with a Tyger cub, I’d never rest until I ripped their throat out.”
Mra winced fastidiously, but the others nodded.
Craig turned to Halix. “Mr. Halix, is Lt. Qwerx on duty this rotation at the InterGalactic Bureau of Investigation?”
Halix nodded, his round face alight. “He will be arriving in a few hours on a shuttle from bureau headquarters. Do you wish him to come directly to you?”
Craig nodded. “Ask him if he will meet here at 1100 hours. Daron, Sirena and Slyde, I want you to work directly with Qwerx to pinpoint just where the surgery took place on Indigo. If you can find the where, you can find who. And then we will very politely inquire, ‘Why?’”
As waves of passionate, focused anger crashed around him like storm waves on a beach, Navos nodded, appreciating Craig’s irony. When the Orion’s tormentor was discovered, it would be a no-holds-barred fight to see which of them got to annihilate the bastard. He meant to make sure it was him. Not content with threatening his ship, now the galactic slime was threatening his own people.
As he walked away from the command deck, he was thinking hard. Why had the attackers chosen an Indigon this time? And why under his very eyes?
Chapter Seven
Professor Loftan Cyan was feeling very pleased with himself. He allowed a small smile to curve his lips upward as he turned to his new employer. But the Pangaean across his desk didn’t return the smile. Instead his corn-silk hair writhed about his throat, a clear sign of anger.
They’d just finished observing as the Indigon youth threw himself again and again at the impenetrable metal of the Orion’s reactor hatch, using his own body as a battering ram until he was bruised and bloody. The only real sound had been the sickening smack of his flesh and bone against the iridium hatch, but his screams of mental anguish echoed deliciously in Cyan’s mind.
He’d enjoyed not only listening to the young fool suffer, but knowing he alone was able to enjoy that particular nuance. His new employer was from a race not endowed with intuitive or empathic powers. If the fellow weren’t a fabulously wealthy galactic shipping magnate, Cyan would feel quite contemptuous of him. But currency spoke clearly in any language and Rra had plenty of it. So, greater intellects must overlook his faults.
Cyan sat back in the graceful chair behind the swirl of Indigon glass that was his desk.
“You weren’t quite as successful as you claimed,” the Pangaean said coldly, his pale green face taut. “Navos was able to subvert your energy and kill the boy.”
Cyan hid his anger at the criticism. He gazed coolly at the businessman, Rra—or at least the holographic image of him that sat opposite. A lovely Pangaean woman was curled by his side, but Cyan ignored her. Judging by her scanty, provocative lii silk gown, she was merely Rra’s mistress. Eye candy, certainly, but unimportant.
“On the contrary, all went according to plan,” he said. “Now I know more about my opponent. I’ve also established his weak spots. Daron Navos is as big a noble fool as ever—and he’s attracted to my stepdaughter.”
“You can control her?” Rra asked.
Cyan smiled unpleasantly. “Malleable as Pangaean clay.”
“That’s good,” the businessman sneered. “Because Commander Navos is clearly not.”
“I can handle him,” Cyan said, his dark blue eyes burning. “The boy was just an experiment, to test the currents. I have a much more powerful tool waiting in the wings for the actual event.”
“How much of your share are you paying this one?” Rra asked.
Cyan began to laugh at his naïveté. “Not a single credit! Why should I when I can have the help for free?”
“Just see to it that it works. I don’t reward failure.”
Their holo-vid image winked out. Cyan rose from his chair with a quick, jerky movement. His hands clenched in impotent rage.
That patronizing bastard.
When this was over and his money safely stowed in an outer-galaxy account, he just might pay Rra a visit—and make him sorry he was ever born. Perhaps arrange a little accident. He would enjoy watching the skinny vegan writhe with the agony of a few broken bones, perhaps some internal injuries. He’d done it before.
“Your visitor is gone?” asked a voice. Cyan turned to see a woman standing in the open door to the balcony. In her slim column of white lii silk, a silken stole wound gracefully about her head and shoulders, she was regal as a lily.
“My dear,” he said, his heartbeat quickening as it always did when he saw her. She was so lovely, so…essentially unobtainable. Even when she allowed him to make love to her, he had the sense that he didn’t really hold her.
This excited him, as did the notion that perhaps his newest scheme would impress her enough to warm those perfect pale cheeks, those cool blue eyes.
“Yes, the fool only wanted to witness our little experiment,” he said.
She turned and he followed her out onto the balcony that overlooked the university fountains.
“Did it go as you’d planned?” she asked.
He leaned on the railing beside her, looking down into the cascading layers of water sparkling in the lights.
“It went just as I planned. She responded to the boy’s distress, as I knew she would. Navos now knows she wields an inordinate amount of power for a female.”
“And did they work together, to stop the boy?” His mistress’s voice was soft, musical as always, but her slender hand gripped the railing tightly.
“Yes. It was quite fascinating, really. They—”
“I don’t wish to hear the details.” Her voice sliced through his words. “Do you think he’s attracted to her?”
Cyan smiled to himself. “They’re no doubt engaged in sexual congress right now. Combining powers can have that effect, and she’s already infatuat
ed with him. She had his holo-vid on her bureau, as if he was that Chaz Jaguari creature all the girls sigh over.”
Her hands tightened even more on the railing and his eyes narrowed. It was as he’d suspected. She had more than profit behind her desire to bring down Navos and his ship.
“You used and discarded him when he was young and naïve,” he said casually. “Perhaps he will do the same with her.”
“Don’t try to be ingenuous,” she said coldly. “It doesn’t suit you. I used him, but I was not…quite through with him yet.”
“Ah, he was supposed to remain with you.” Amusement tickled the back of his throat and he swallowed a laugh which he knew she wouldn’t appreciate. “As your consort.”
“Yes, but now I have you, haven’t I?” she murmured. She turned to him, one elegant hand lifting to touch his face. “And you won’t fail me…will you, Loftan?”
He straightened. Such lovely eyes, with so much danger lurking in their icy depths. “No. I won’t.”
Her lips curved up. “You want to destroy your stepdaughter as much as I want to destroy Daron Navos, don’t you?”
“Certainly,” he agreed readily. “All that lovely money. Her mother should’ve left it all to me. Then I wouldn’t have to kill her daughter to get it.”
She began to laugh and he joined her. He kissed her long throat, breathing deeply of her exotic perfume.
“Tell me how they’ll die,” she demanded, sliding her arms around his neck.
He bent to lift her into his arms and carried her back into his office. The elegant leather sofa made a delightful place for sex.
“If you insist,” he replied. As he laid her on the pale leather and lifted her skirts, he murmured his plan into her ear.
It excited both of them.
On Pangaea, Rra sprang up from the elegant divan in his penthouse sitting room and began to pace back and forth before the huge, floor-to-ceiling windows. Lly sat perfectly still, her eyes never leaving him. She did her best to appear relaxed, a little smile playing about her tinted lips, hoping he wouldn’t notice her silky green hair was wrapped tightly about her slender throat.