by Kim Knox
“Clear.” Her gut tightened and she tried not to stumble over the twisted limbs of the dead guards. Guilt tugged at her. She’d never killed anyone, never put anyone in a position to be killed before. She winced. Not like that. And now she was responsible for the deaths of the men crashed out across the corridor floor, missing faces, limbs, their skin seared from the flash-burn of Ramius’ weapons. Memories from her past burst up, of sprawled bodies and how she’d curled into a tiny, terrified ball and pretended to be as dead as those around her…
She bit at her lip and willed away the tightness of her throat. A tear slipped free. Chance scrubbed at her wet cheek. What little she could remember of her past she’d shoved down, kept it locked away…but the raw, sharp stink of burnt flesh ripped it back into the forefront of her mind.
“I killed them, not you,” Ramius muttered, dragging her into the splash of light and the wide bay beyond. “Remember, it was them or us.”
The three guards assigned to the transport were dead on the floor, flesh bubbled and raw over their chests and faces. Ramius’ pulled her in front of him, pushed the holster strap of the Etius-90 over his shoulder and gripped her upper arms. “You need to get us in there.”
The hard reality of his hands, rather than his words, broke through her spiralling thoughts. She stared at the clear wall ahead of her, the distorted sleekness of the chancellor’s Maro Vitesse locked into the securing clamps. All right, something she could focus on: a lock. And she would have to break it the old fashioned way. “The senior guard would have a—”
“This?” Ramius’ fingers lifted from her arm and a second later he held a bloodstained data chip in front of her eyes. “His implanted data core.”
She could do this. If she didn’t, they, she, was dead. Hard vacuum, boiling saliva, her last air ripping from her throat into the void just before she froze and thankfully lost consciousness. The hideous death repeated through her brain. No, she wanted to live.
Chance willed her heart to slow and took the data core, wiping it on her jacket. Small and diamond-shaped, it gave off a soft pulsing glow, a glow that faded even as she looked at it. Shit. Its residual energy had only seconds. Then it would shut down and shatter at the death of its owner. She stared at it, focused and the warmth, power of her own chip flowed over the stuttering device and linked with it.
The wall shimmered, thinned and already Ramius was moving, shoving her ahead of him and through the now gelatinous substance.
On the other side, breath exploded from her body. She staggered and fought to stay upright. Chance turned on him. “I had time!”
“Did you?” He wiped the grey dust from her fingers, the last remains of the guard’s data core drifting into the cold air. “Now you have to get us on the ship.”
She glared at him, but he weathered it with an uplifted eyebrow, and the dark, hard shine to his eyes flushed her skin with fear and arousal. Her exposed breast and peaked nipple rubbed up against the rough fabric of her jacket, and something in his face, the way his gaze trailed down her body, said he knew it.
Heat pooled in her belly and Chance took one step closer to him. The urgency and horror of escape faded away. She wanted nothing more than to fist her fingers in his damp hair, pull his head down and cover his mouth with her own. Her lips burned with the need, her blood pounding. The insanity of what she wanted to do with John Ramius, of all men, beat at her temples, but she couldn’t deny it.
She pressed a hand against his chest, feeling his heart thud. His hand closed over hers, his fingers tight and still, and something in his eyes, a quick, dark need, had her moving closer. The contact, the touch of his skin against hers, seared through her…but Ramius eased her palm away. She held down a shiver as he released her. Yes, she’d forgotten. Ramius wasn’t interested. Not really.
“The ship, Chance,” he murmured, the sudden flare of desire gone. She began to doubt she’d ever seen it. “We need to get away fast.”
She turned on her heel so that he didn’t see her wince. Well, he was a murdering psychopath… That had to be the reason he rejected her. Her wince turned into a reluctant, wry smile. Yes, such an obvious solution.
The hull of the Vitesse swept above her in sleek, dark curves, the sinuous design making her heart miss a beat. “Too beautiful,” she murmured and stretched out a hand to tease light fingers over the gleaming hull.
A shiver ran along her arm. “O-h-h.” The soft sound left her lips without her consent. “You’re an upgrade and a half, aren’t you?”
“What is it?”
Chance snapped her head back to look at him. “Quiet,” she muttered. “You’ll frighten him.”
Ramius frowned. “It’s a transport.”
“With serious neural modifications. Dark energy and this? The outer governor obviously thinks very highly of Chancellor Connor.” Chance pressed her palm to the warm hull and closed her eyes. She pulled in a soft breath and rolled her neck, willing her body to relax. The ship quivered, and she didn’t want to build up any more fear in the terrified vessel.
Her thoughts stretched out, her chip flowing over the smooth hull, caressing it, soothing its skittish thoughts. “My name is Melissa.”
“You shouldn’t be here.”
Chance bit back a smile. She couldn’t let the Vitesse feel her satisfaction at breaking through his first line of defence. He sounded young, uncertain, untried. Her thoughts streamed over his, picking at his logs, and she almost winced. Connor had taken a new ship barely out of its mould and thrown him into a long haul. Bastard. He should’ve treated such a beauty with a lot more respect. “Are you all right? I know this is your first journey. It can be frightening…”
“I wasn’t frightened.”
Chance’s heart squeezed. Bravado wrapped around his thoughts, but she could feel past memories, the uncontrolled terror as he ripped through the endless second of a dark energy sphere, the chancellor’s pilot thrashing the untried ship. She hoped the bloody pilot lay dead and mutilated in the corridor behind her. “Of course you weren’t.” She let her smile filter over his consciousness. “Well, I know the chancellor is due back soon. I should go—”
“Go?”
His panic washed over her, racing through her blood as the ship tried to hold onto her. “Would you like us to stay?”
The hull shimmered and a soft burst of air whooshed around her legs. He had opened the ship to them.
“About time…” Ramius muttered.
Chance glared at him and stroked her hand over the Vitesse. “Thank you…”
“Drew.”
“And this is John.”
The artificial mind at the core of the ship paused for a long moment. “I can’t connect with his mind. He’s not implanted.”
“No…but he won’t harm you.” She eased her fingers free and the intimate contact with the Vitesse faded away. She hadn’t lied. Ramius was a serious threat only to other humans. “We’re in.” She jogged up the ramp and stepped into the primary airlock. The decontamination film swept over her skin, little burning pricks of light and energy that made her shudder.
Ramius stood behind her, obviously bearing the same pain with greater ease. Well, hell, he was an elite, augmented human from Earth. Who knew what he could withstand? The opening in the hull melted over, sealing them inside before a new hatchway eased away in front of them. Soft lighting lit a short corridor and, taking a deep breath, Chance followed it.
“We need to move, Chance.” Ramius’ hard mutter ran her skin with goose bumps. “The detention centre is locked down. They’ll find Connor’s men…and then it’s all over.”
“Drew,” she waved her hand at the soft, arching curve of the gangway, “this ship, is newly moulded. He should have stayed in dock for another month, at least. Connor and his bastard pilot thrashed him.”
Ramius scrubbed his hand over his jaw, his hand rasping against his bristled skin. “He’s traumatised.”
She sighed. Chance was very aware that they had to run, but demandin
g it of a scared transport wouldn’t get them far at all. At least Ramius seemed to understand her problem now. “He’s a very young ship.”
“Then do what you have to do.”
And he was letting her get on with it. Good.
The gangway ended in a the wide curve of arching transparent shielding, the organic struts growing from the floor in widening ivory to form the solid sheet above their heads. A control panel curved around the hull, instrumentation glistening in the dimness. The air was cool, fresh and still held the sharp hint of the Vitesse’s recent moulding.
“Ramius, the command chair.” She pointed to the heavily padded seat set back against the bulkhead.
He gave her a brief, almost-mocking salute, and she glared at him, watching as he settled into the chair. Ramius set the Etius-90 on the narrow platform running alongside the chair. His fingers tapped over the smooth surface, and a white sheen glowed briefly over the weapon. She blinked. He’d flown a Vitesse before…which made her mind turn. Who the hell had he been before he became the Butcher?
Chance dropped into the low pilot’s chair, the soft foam moulding to her, warm tendrils snaking over her hands, throat, thighs, waist. She twisted against the strange sensation, but then willed herself to stillness. The transport needed bodily contact with her. It was the only way she could fly the thing. “Well, Drew, shall we leave this place?”
“I don’t think…” His soft voice echoed around the command centre, too loud, and Chance could feel his embarrassment through the connecting web of vines slick against her skin. “I’m Chancellor Connor’s ship. I must have errored in allowing you on board in the first place.”
She caught the tendril that slicked back over her hand, gripping it lightly, her thumb rubbing soothing circles into the synthetic gel. “You can make the decision, Drew. John made certain that your pilot stayed on the detention centre. You’re free.”
“I still belong—”
“You don’t belong to anyone.” Ramius’ smooth, reassuring voice eased through Drew’s uncertainty. It forced an unexpected shiver in Chance, and she couldn’t explain why to herself. “No one owns you. They never will. The choice is yours. You’re a Maro Vitesse.”
Something like the first stirrings of pride rippled through the ship’s consciousness, and her connections to its mind thickened. He would take guidance from her, she felt it. “Should we go exploring, Drew?” She couldn’t keep the smile from her voice. The itch in her fingers burned. Chance knew how to fly, but she’d wrapped herself up in junk heaps one journey ahead of the scrapper. The sleek beauty, the power, the sheer joy at the prospect of flying a Vitesse had her stomach tight.
The ship accepted, blending his thoughts with hers. Chance closed her eyes and let out a slow breath as the gleaming hull became her own skin. “All right,” she murmured. Information flowed through her in a delicious stream. Damn, expensive tech felt nice. “They’ve secured the clamps…but that should be an easy bypass for us both.” Her confidence echoed in the thoughts of the ship. “Ready for coordinates, John.”
Chapter Four
Damn it, she had to stop using his first name. Reason told him Chance was trying to keep the ship calm, not to spook it, but still it stabbed at him. The tight ache in his chest made breathing hard and he couldn’t focus. No one had used his first name. Not since Chloe… Ramius clamped down any thoughts of her. He didn’t need that madness overtaking his brain.
“A small, irregular moon, Erinome.” The ship would plot the course. He had faith that Chance would get them out of the detention centre. He’d been waiting for someone like her for a long time. She was a talented thief, but she was an unproven pilot, and that did have him worried.
“Understood.” Chance’s voice coalesced with the transports, and Ramius held down a wince. His shields had thinned and her thoughts, the ship’s, leeched into his brain. One of the supposed benefits of being elite: received organic telepathy. And he was one of the really lucky ones. He’d had the curse since birth.
Ramius let out a heavy sigh and sank back into the command chair. Hell, it had been an age since he’d felt the comfort, the ease of luxury. Before the drilling platform, it had been his life. He closed his eyes and forced all thought from his brain. The past was a place he didn’t visit anymore.
He would get them to Erinome, the bolt-hole hollowed out of the innocuous Jovian moon. Then he’d begin…and end it.
He refocused on his pilot…and it didn’t help that his chair positioned him for the perfect view of her long, bare legs. There was that beat in his blood again and the unwanted stir of his cock. Chance didn’t care what he was, that the Jovian government had convicted him of mass murder. Ramius scrubbed at his jaw and willed down the memory of her stripping, of her exposing herself to draw out Connor’s personal guard. It would be so easy to push her up against the nearest wall and sink into her soft flesh—
“We’re free of the clamps.”
Strain threaded through Chance’s voice and brought back Ramius’ wandering thoughts. Yes, thinking about fucking her was not one of his better ideas. And he’d had more than his share of bad ones.
“Good work.” He straightened in his chair and ran his fingers through his hair, focusing on the wide transparency of the shields. “Are your systems fully initialised, Drew?”
There was a pause and Ramius felt a stone drop in his stomach. He was relying on complete novices. Not the greatest plan he’d ever had, but it was all he had right then. “Drew?”
“I’m ready, John.”
His mouth thinned, but he stopped himself from ordering the ship to use the correct title. As Chance said, the ship was young…and they were stealing him. He could hardly be pedantic. “Then we’re ready. Pilot, take us out.”
The Vitesse plummeted. Engines screamed around them, the hull shuddering and the exterior of the detention centre streaked past. Gas erupted from the console, rolling white and curled across the smooth floor. “What the fu—” Ramius grabbed at the arms of the chair as the down force lifted his body. “Chance!”
“Sorry, I’m not used to this ship.” The words came out of gritted teeth, and she twisted under the close, connecting vines. “If you can do any better…”
“I don’t have an implant. At this minute, I’m thinking about getting one.”
Callisto’s pocked, brown surface burst over the transparent shields. The bright, flickering glow of interconnecting StarCluster habitats clawed to the moon’s surface shot past. Warning sirens blared, an automatic system as they crashed through designated space lanes—
“No proximity claxon.” Ramius cursed and fought to strap himself into his command chair. “They know we’re out here. They’ve cleared surrounding traffic.”
“I’m detecting—” Drew’s nervous voice rose above the teeth-jarring whine of the warning sirens…just as the whole ship rocked. Internal systems flickered and consoles flamed red. Ramius tried to contain the worst of the breaches with rapid manual instructions, his fingers flying over the pad of the command chair. But the pilot had the most control. Shit. Connor had wanted to space them alive. Seemed he would get his wish.
“Chance, kill the sirens and throw up his shields.”
“I’m trying—”
“Try harder.”
Her cursing burst against the sudden silence. “There,” she muttered. “Siren’s killed.” A white flare flashed over the outer surface of the ship. “And shields. I think I’m getting the hang of this—”
The quick, high-pitched blip of the proximity alarm cut through her words. Ramius’ heart clenched. There, dropping out of the docking convex of the detention centre, burst a fast stream of small craft. Magnified on the sweep of the shield, they displayed as curved fighters. “Is he equipped with weapons?”
“No.” Chance had more control, veering away and finding increasing speed. Nothing could outrun a Maro Vitesse, nothing—an energy charge impacted the shield reducing it by a fifth—except weapons’ fire. “We can outrun them. Dre
w, come on!”
“Charge the dark energy.”
Chance craned her head back and Ramius met her glare. “I will not take him into that space—”
Another impact, followed by three more in rapid, sickening succession. Ramius pulled in a tight breath. “Drew, your shields are about to fail. It’s your decision. Use dark energy to get us out of here.”
“I…”
Fear radiated from the ship. Ramius knew Chance was right. The pilot and Connor were complete bastards for taking out so young a ship…but he could be, and had been, just as ruthless. “Freedom means making hard choices. It’s your time to acknowledge that.”
“Ramius…”
He ignored Chance’s warning growl. It almost had a smile tugging at his lips. She knew what he was, what he’d been found guilty of doing, witnessed it as he took out Connor’s personal guard…but still she defied him. “Drew?”
The lights dimmed, all power sucked into the outer shield as it formed a hard shell around the Vitesse. The ship had taken the bait. A deep thrum vibrated through Ramius’ body, and he expelled a sharp breath, shutting his eyes. His heart thudded, and the rush of adrenalin forced him to grip the arms of the command chair until his fingers ached.
He hated dark energy. Loathed it.
Chance bit down on a scream, but the false rush of her cries echoed around her, through her, in an endless surge of sound in the twisted reality of a dark energy sphere. Hot needles pushed hard under her skin. The connecting vines of the ship seared her flesh, burning, freezing. This was wrong. She couldn’t contain the agony. Her panicked mind sought the comfort of the ship, a connection in the maelstrom of pain and darkness tearing around her thoughts. “Drew…”
“Almost. Chance, stay calm. Not long now.”
She grabbed at the voice, its strength, and held onto it through the endless, ripping pain—
“Chance.”