by Autumn Dawn
Perhaps it was the colors.
She’d been seeing colors at the edge of her vision so long she barely noticed them now, but occasionally some strong emotion would bring them sharply into focus. Lately Jaide had even begun to detect subtle signatures in the colors she saw around individuals, a key note as plain as a mole or a scar. Presuming this to be normal, she’d never mentioned it to anyone.
It was perhaps a quarter hour into filming that Jaide saw a familiar flash of color out of the corner of her eye. For the first time in her life her body acted without consulting her brain. In an instant she was out of her chair and flinging herself at the startled Belsi. Both of them went down with a crash as blue laser fire speared the screen behind where Belsi had been.
Pain cracked in Jaide’s side as she shattered a ceramic pot at the side of the stage. Stunned by the force of the blow and momentarily unable to draw breath, she stared in numb horror as Quadril appeared from the edge of the stage and lobbed a small object at them. It was a bomb.
They were going to die.
Even as she thought it the silver ball was shot out of the air. Grenade fragments disintegrated into so much dust.
Less than a second later another shot vaporized half of Quadril’s head.
Shaken, Jaide searched for the source of the shots. From the shadows stepped Chrys. Without sparing a glance for the body, Chrys ran to where Belsi crouched beside her and gently lifted Jaide off the broken shards.
She hissed and nearly blacked out. Blast! That hurt.
“Easy,” Chrys soothed as he picked her up. “We’ll get you to a doctor.”
“Not that bad,” she gasped. She hated doctors.
“Why did you do it?” Belsi asked tearfully, following them. “The baby—”
“Will be fine,” Jaide assured her even as a strange lethargy came over her. Great. She was going to faint in front of her brother. How embarrass....
The world went black.
“How did you know to be there just at the right time?”
Chrys smiled at her from his chair beside the hospital bed. He’d been there ever since she’d woken up. Darkness had fallen outside, but he showed no inclination to leave. Somehow the idea of him playing bodyguard didn’t irk her quite as badly as it once would have.
The chair creaked as he leaned back. “We didn’t. The plan was for me to be there in the background just in case Quadril decided to seek a little vengeance.”
“But what about the Doc’s call?”
“A ruse by Quadril to get Nemesis and Skye away. Most likely Quadril planned to kill Belsi and then try to get to you and Sesame. He thought no one would look after you the way your husbands could.”
She smiled and squeezed his hand, ignoring the aching protest from her torn up ribs. “He was wrong. We make a good team. Maybe we should go into business.”
“Don’t even think it,” Chrys warned her with mock sternness. “You’re going to be on your best behavior until after the baby’s born.”
Jaide made a face but didn’t argue. “Don’t worry. I’ve had enough excitement for a while. I wouldn’t doubt that Skye is planning to stand over me for the rest of the pregnancy just to make sure.”
“If he doesn’t, I will.”
She shook her head in mock sorrow. “There is no trust in the world today.” Something troubled her, though. “What about the Doc? Quadril must have forced him to go along with his plan. Is he all right?” When he didn’t answer right away, her eyes narrowed. “Tell me. He was my friend.”
“He’s missing. Quadril never left this planet, so we think his accomplices must have him.” He left unsaid the possibility that the Doc might be working with them.
Jaide bolted up, grabbed her ribs as pain tore through them, and slowly sank back down. She swatted at Chrys’ helping hands and pinned him with a glare. “He would never willingly do something like this, Chrys! I know him. There aren’t many people I trust in this galaxy, but he’s one of them. You’ve got to help him.”
“Trust me, we’re doing everything we can to recover him.” He gave her a grim smile. “Your friend is one of the most brilliant scientists in known space. Rest assured we don’t want anyone who would resort to kidnapping harnessing his brain.”
“He won’t comply. He’d sabotage anything they made him build. I would.”
Chrys’ expression never changed. “We’ll find him.”
Jaide couldn’t remain content with that. Someone, probably Carthack, had kidnapped her friend. She could tell Chrys thought he might be guilty. Probably Skye thought so to. She needed to help him but could do nothing from this hospital bed. “Any thoughts on where they might be?”
He watched her warily, but must have decided she wouldn’t dare try anything dangerous in her condition. “We checked. They have to still be on the station. No one meeting the Doc’s height requirements has left the station, nor has any cargo. Skye and Nemesis already wasted time tracking down a decoy ship. Whatever they’re up to, they chose to hide in plain sight.”
His use of the word “they” clinched it. Her men thought the Doc was working with the bad guys. She didn’t know what made them so sure, but with that attitude they might shoot first and ask questions later.
The Doc was in trouble.
Chapter 11
Jaide eased into the Splinter’s pilot chair, hissing as the movement pulled her torn muscles tight. The injury wasn’t life-threatening, but it was painful. She’d taken just enough pain medication to remind her to take it easy.
She fired up the engines, keeping her eyes on the monitors. Chrys was going to be furious when he woke up, and worried. She’d hated to knock him out, but he’d have never let her leave. The hard part had been wrestling his shirt off him to replace the one she’d trashed earlier. By the time she was finished, sweat had trickled into her wound, stinging the blazes out of it. The man weighed more than a small shuttle craft.
It had been ridiculously easy to lure the guards inside and stun them with her brother’s gun. She’d simply walked out like any other visitor, intent on going home for the night.
The guards at the shuttle bay had been surprised to see her arrive without escort. She grimaced as she recalled the pair’s insistence on calling her bodyguards. Skye was going to be furious at the number of men she’d stunned on this mission.
Best not to think about him.
As the lights of the city merged behind her into one of many bright dots on the shadowy continents of Tantalus she tried to think of a plan. Skye couldn’t know where she was lest he bubble wrap her to keep her out of danger. It would be harder, since Chrys would tell him she was coming, and she’d have to stay on her toes. Good thing she’d have help.
Doc had many friends on the station, scientists who’d be eager to help rescue him, men and women who’d be angry that anyone would dare bother one of their own.
There was nothing more dangerous than a mad scientist.
“Jaide? What are you doing here?” A stocky, middle-aged man dressed in paisley looked up from his bubbling experiment in surprise. A curled glass tube guided the blue vapor from the top of the beaker through a series of chambers. Multicolored liquids with similar condensers crowded the work table.
She knew better than to ask.
His twin, wearing a long tie-dyed lab coat, raised his protective glasses and left his place by a hissing, clattering hinged box. “We’re honored. The queen of all pilots has returned.” He gave her a playful leer.
She grinned at the infamous albino twins, Marx and Paulo. “How could I resist? You know you have my heart.”
Marx snorted and crossed his arms. “What would we do with a rock like that?”
Jaide sobered. “Have you heard from the Doc?”
Two pairs of eyes, keen with intelligence, fixed on her. “No one has, not for days.” The men glared at each other, disgusted by their unanimous and simultaneous answer.
“No one has seen him,” Marx finished with a frown. “What do you know?”<
br />
“What?”
Skye came out of his chair, stared at Chrys’ guilty face on the Black Tide’s monitor. “She what!”
“I’m sorry, Skye. I never expected her to do something so rash in her condition.”
“I don’t see why not,” Lore muttered, but averted his face when Skye glared at him.
Taking a deep breath to calm his racing pulse, Skye thought about the danger. Carthack was somewhere on this station. He knew his time was limited. He was making a run for it, dragging key hostages with him. Since no intelligence had been received from within his close circle of followers and paid thugs, it was impossible to know who was with him willingly, including Dr. Trad Mezinley, or Doc, or as he was known.
“Why is she so concerned about him?” Skye asked, following up one of Chrys’ earlier statements. Jealousy tried to lodge in his mind, but he fought it. He knew well enough his wife hadn’t slept with anyone else.
He was the one she’d come back for.
Uncertainty nagged at him. So why did she risk so much for Mezinley?
Chrys’ eyes narrowed. “He’s her friend. Would you do less for me?”
Relieved to hear someone talking sense, Skye admitted, “No. I wouldn’t. But she still has no business taking a risk like this. What can she do that we’re not already doing?”
Nemesis spoke for the first time. “She knows this place, these people. She lived here. I don’t think she’ll take more risks than she absolutely has to.”
Skye’s fingers flew as he brought up the data for the private landing strips. “It’s her idea of acceptable risks I’m worried about.” There! She’d snuck in behind a test ship and landed the Splinter inside a sealed bay. There was no way they could get to her without going through the scientists. Before he could decide which one to contact first, an incoming message beeped. “Hang on, Chrys. I’m switching you to audio only.” He pressed a button. “Yes?”
A rotund, grandmotherly type smiled at him. “Hello. My name is Dr. Kaal. I’ve called to offer you the services of myself and several of my colleges in finding Dr. Mezinley.”
Skye exchanged cautious looks with Lore. “What do you know of our search, Doctor?”
“Your wife told us all about it.”
His jaw clenched, he forced himself to ask calmly, “Is she there?”
Kaal laughed merrily, winked at him. “Would you like our help, Commander? We have a very good idea where they’ve taken Dr. Mezinley, and we’d very much like to help retrieve him.”
Nemesis nodded at him. Skye grudgingly admitted, “You’ve made us an offer we can’t refuse. What do you know?”
Jaide studied the blueprints of the science station’s underground waste recycling system as she munched on a piece of pale lavender cheese. It really wasn’t bad, if she ignored its origins in one of one of Marx’s beakers. “So this chamber here,” she pointed with her cheese to the one in question, “has been closed for nearly two years? What did they do with all the waste?”
“T-the contents would have c-composted by now,” Squiggly, a thin biologist, pointed out. “T-they c-could walk on it.”
Marx shrugged when she sent him a questioning frown. “It is earth by now. The microbial digestion is very complete. It wouldn’t be any different than walking on garden loam.” He cocked his head thoughtfully. “Might even be pleasant.”
Doubtful, she shook her head. “You’re the experts. It’s certainly large enough, but I never would have expected them to hide there.”
“Exactly,” Marx agreed.
“Besides, it’s mathematically the most likely place for them to hide.” Kaal scratched her nose with her glittering pink stylus. “There’s no other place big enough to hide the number of men reputed to be with Carthak that isn’t either accessible to the public or soon to be noticed.”
Jaide nodded. They’d used the Splinter’s instruments to confirm their speculation. Sure enough, several moving heat sources had been discovered inside. “And the distraction we’ve planned? How’s it coming?”
Everyone looked at Paulo, who was busy at his workbench. “It comes.”
Jaide fell silent as her companions talked. The ventilation ducts into the chamber had security beams. Skye had insisted he and the Draconians could take care of them, but her team had come up with a way to cut the power to the room while making it seem to be a system-wide failure. The ruse would provide only a seconds long window for the Draconians to act, but it was enough. If all went well this would be the end of Carthack.
If he was here. They still weren’t sure of that.
Frustration and a sense of unease gnawed at her. Everything they’d done so far were things Skye and Nemesis could have done without their help, though maybe not as quickly. All she’d accomplished so far was to make her husband very tense, something he didn’t need right now. If she helped save the Doc it would be worthwhile. If not.…
Failure was not an option.
“Don’t touch the door!”
Nemesis froze, his hand centimeters from the handle. Flanked by their backup, he’d been about to slam it open. “Why?”
“It’s rigged.” Grim with realization, Skye showed him the readouts on his handheld sensor. “This still shows someone inside, but I’m not certain they haven’t figured out a way to send a false signal. The vital signs are too regular. Chances are Carthack has bolted.”
“We have to check. See what you can do with it, Lore,” Nemesis ordered grimly.
As Lore brushed past Skye to get to the door Skye contacted Jaide’s team, thinking furiously. “What projects is Mezinley working on right now?”
A moment of silence followed. After a moment Marx answered, “An advanced Splinter type prototype. Detachable technology, I believe.”
“Where is it?”
“In his—” A loud exclamation in the background cut him off. “Jaide? Where are you going? Jaide!”
A cold sweat chilled Skye’s body. At that moment one of the soldiers with him said, “Commander? The tower is picking up some odd signals. It’s a ship launching-they think. The doors to Dr. Mezinley’s lab just opened, but they can’t detect anything coming out.”
Skye headed for his ship at a dead run. Forget Carthackhe had to stop his wife.
Jaide barely paused to toss Marx’s newest invention in the ship’s locker before sealing her helmet to her pressure suit. Frantic fingers flew over the controls as she prepared for lift off. Carthack was not getting away; not this time!
Her condition would prevent her from engaging his ship, but she could follow and—
A noise behind her made her freeze. Very slowly, she turned.
Looking a little more unkempt than the images she’d seen of him, Carthack stood behind her, a groggy, bloody and weaving Doc at his side, held up by a second man with a gun.
Carthack smiled unpleasantly and aimed Marx’s bulky rifle at her. “So sorry to meet like this, dear. I’ve heard so much about you. But if you don’t mind, I have to borrow your ship now.”
Unable to hide her grin of triumph, Jaide spread her arms wide. “Please.”
Carthack shot her.
A big blue bubble shot out of the barrel, thumped against Jaide’s chest and spread to envelop her in a blue plastic sphere. As Carthak stared in consternation, she reached out, kicked him in the knee, snatched the gun from him and whacked him with the butt. He dropped like a brick.
Ignoring the beam that glanced harmlessly off her armored bubble from the other man’s gun, she slammed the butt into his face. Bone crunched and blood spurted out as the man screamed. Another blow to his temple put an end to his misery.
Nearly overwhelmed by sudden nausea, she hunched over, trying not to vomit.
Pregnancy could be so hard on a woman.
As soon as she’d recovered somewhat, Jaide knelt beside the Doc. Barely conscious, he nevertheless gave her a faint grin. “My hero.”
She snorted, relieved to see him mostly in one piece. “Very funny. Just be glad Marx decide
d to protect you with a force field instead of inventing something more deadly.” She charged the shield with a mild jolt of electricity from the gun and set it on the floor. The blue bubble evaporated.
“I see Marx is about to win another patent. Blast! Now we’ll be even again.” He groaned as she helped him to the co-pilot’s chair and called security and the paramedics.
Amusement at their friendly rivalry made Jaide smile, but it was temporary. Skye would not be pleased when he heard how she’d been in danger.
Skye’s golden eyes glowed with cold anger. They had just arrived home on separate ships, giving his anger plenty of time to fester. “Are you truly so convinced of my incompetence that you feel the need to risk our child to prove it?”
Jaide flinched. It hadn’t been about that. “I—”
“Enough!” His chest rose and fell with the force of the adrenaline rushing through him. Never in his life had he been so angry. “Never again. Do you hear me, woman? Never again!” He glared at her for a moment, then stalked off before he did some damage. Part of him wanted nothing more than to stay and shout at her until she was reduced to a quivering puddle, but there were other, better ways to deal with his anger.
Once outside he hopped in his cruiser and took it for a drive. Every time he replayed Jaide’s actions in his head his hands tightened on the control yoke. Such foolishness, and for what? So she could play the hero?
It took a good hour, but gradually he accepted that she might not have had that intention, though the wound to his pride went deep. He did not need his wife to help him do his job! No man would take what she’d done lightly. Why couldn’t she understand that? What would it take to keep her from doing it ever again?
The answer flashed in his mind and his jaw tightened. At first he fought it, but it was the only solution he could see. Grimly determined, he put in a call to Nemesis.
Jaide poked at her solitary dinner, more depressed than she’d been in a long time. Skye hadn’t come home-again. It was the fifth night this week, and she was sick of it.