The Boundary Zone

by A. B. Keuser

  The mechanic whirr of a gurney echoed through the room as the medical staff rushed in and took Cable's place. Mersen was with them and he gave them all a look that spoke volumes.

  "Take that piece of shit to the brig. I won't look at him." With that dismissal, three of the soldiers Mersen had brought with him took hold of Oliver and carted him out.

  The glare Mersen leveled on her wasn't exactly unwarranted. Here mere presence on his ship had just caused a bar brawl in his mess that lead to two soldiers stabbed and another heading to the brig for who knew what punishment. She had a feeling several of the others around her felt like she was bad news too. She bit her tongue, though she wanted to scream at them that this was the last place in the galaxy she wanted to be.

  "I see you're settling in well, Captain Flack. Perhaps you should attempt to limit your interactions with the rest of the crew when possible."

  Mack knew it was a--barely--polite way of saying he wanted to confine her to quarters, but couldn't since she'd done nothing wrong. She smiled as though it were some sort of an inside joke between the two of them and took a sadistic pleasure in the confused grimace it earned her.

  Keep them on their toes, Mack.

  The thought wiped the smile off her face. Taking Aaron's advice was probably not the best option. Especially not in present company.

  Mersen motioned for Cable to follow him to the side of the mess that was quickly emptying, and Mack sat back down at her tray, watching them, though she had no intention of eating any more of the slop. Kate Stacy--though Mack figured she ought to start thinking of the woman as Lieutenant - came to join them, and though they passed back and forth trivial, useless information, their eyes were locked on the spectacle before them.

  Cable stood rod straight as Mersen spoke quickly and inaudibly, Mack watched as his fists clenched, and the set of his jaw shifted. "This is not going to be good." Raza said quietly, tipping back her cooling coffee. "I've seen that look. Cable wants to punch the man in the face."

  "He won't. He's got a job to do, and he's not going to let anyone else do it. Besides, we've got to find two new squad members, we'd be royally fucked if we had to find a new commander." Peezus was watching them with narrowed eyes.

  "I dunno, they gave Mack her brother's rank and service history... she's due for a promotion."

  Mack flinched away from the idea. "What?"

  "You seriously didn't look at that?” Raza was grinning, and Mack didn’t know if she was being serious or not. “I figured it was some sort of a local clerical error, but it’s like they're trying to bury your conscription pretty deep. According to the logs you signed up with your brother. There are a few discrepancies so far as I can tell, but they did a number on your file."

  Mack didn't turn back to her as she said it, watching as Cable barked something inaudible at Mersen and the man's face turned the color of a Thua beet.

  And then it was over. Mersen walked away and Cable turned back to them, but his eyes were locked on something beyond them. And his glare spoke of death.

  Mack turned following his eye line and saw what he was pissed about. Bezzon leaned against the wall, his arms crossed over his chest, a Cheshire smile plastered on his face as though he'd just won the Lotto. "I think I know why he's pissed."

  The others turned to look, but if they figured it out, they didn't have time to voice their suspicions before Cable confirmed hers. "Because the little weasel has been going over people’s heads and because Mersen wants us off his boat as quickly as possible... Lieutenant Bezzon is taking Marcus' place on the team."

  Groans drown out any other response.

  “The only upside, is that I managed to secure you, Lieutenant Stacy, as our other replacement.” He cast her an apologetic look. "Honestly, I'd like to shoot him right now... but that would mean a court martial and you guys getting stuck with a new commander - I doubt they'd take my recommendation after that sort of action."

  "I can push him down an air shaft if you want." Stacy said, without looking back at the man in question.

  "No. It's best if we all treat him like the necessary evil he is and get on with our jobs.” Raza stared at the man openly, her glare as sharp as the knife strapped to her leg.

  With a nod, Peezus stood and left them, he had things to take care of before they took off. The mission started early for him and ended later than it did for anyone else--other than Cable. The life of a commo was never one she'd envy.

  Before Cable could leave, she dropped a hand on his arm, keeping him in place. She didn’t care if it wasn’t to regulation, or looked odd to anyone around them.

  "I don't think that was random. In fact, I think it was very specifically planned."

  "Oliver meant to attack Marcus?"

  "No, I honestly think Oliver feels I should be dead. Was he overly vocal about Aaron's betrayal?"

  There was a pause as Raza and Cable glanced at each other and then down at the table. "Yes, his younger brother was one of the soldiers killed in raids staged by the people Aaron sold the information to."

  "So, if someone was looking to make a scene, or say, incapacitate a member of a squadron in order to take their place... then setting Oliver off with a goal he already wants to see come to fruition might be an ideal way to do it."

  "You think Bezzon sent him?"

  "He wouldn't want you dead... he may hate you for what happened in Gunk's bar before the explosion, but he's kind of set on the idea of screwing you, so he wouldn't want you to die before he gets that chance."

  "No, but what if he knew Marcus would try to protect me… or Raza or Peezus for that matter."

  "Getting rid of Peezus wouldn't be productive. He's not a commo.”

  And the little man didn’t look like he was going to jump in front of a punch for anyone.

  “I have a feeling he was willing to take that risk."

  "Anyway, it's just speculation. Chances are that bastard got lucky."

  Mack tilted her head to the side, taking care to not look at the lieutenant across the room. "Unless you account for the fact that I watched him point directly at me before the other three got up and decided it was time to see how easy it would be to kill me."

  Cable straightened his shoulders and set his jaw. “Finish up whatever food you have left and report to your bunks. We leave at oh-five thirty.”

  Peezus nodded and hurried away, and Bezzon followed, after a moment’s hesitation.

  He held out his hand, a flat gesture, low. And Mack knew both of the women beside her recognized the sign. She might have known him the longest, but they knew him better in this sphere.

  “I don’t want you going anywhere alone.” He looked from her to Raza. “One of you needs to be with her at all times. And all three of you need to keep an eye on Bezzon. He’s up to something.”

  “Let’s hope we find out what before it bites us in the ass.” Stacy nodded at his quiet dismissal, and Mack followed her out, leaving Raza and Cable to discuss whatever needed to be prepped for tomorrow’s mission.

  Bezzon was in the hall, but he didn’t approach them as they passed.

  She’d learned long ago to trust Cable’s intuition. Something was off with Bezzon, and she was certain it wasn’t a simple matter of the man looking for a promotion.

  Sixteen

  Bezzon joined the team late, and cocky as anything. Mack followed the lead of the others and after a cursory glance she ignored him just as easily as the others did. The others’ duties had been divided among the others, Bezzon was nothing more than an extra gun for this mission.

  The ride to the asteroid wasn’t long. Cramped though they were in the back of a Striker – the fleet’s version of a small transport shuttle, armed to the teeth and carrying a special shielding upgrade – a quick relay point jump and a fifteen minute slow run was all it took to get from the Dendratic to their target.

  It was too long as far as Kenzie was concerned, but then, any amount of time was too long when Bezzon was leering at her from his place
, tethered into his seat from across the small command hub.

  Mack would have preferred he’d stayed on the ship and scrubbed off to Selestiana with the others, but “Special Provisionary Orders” held him there, just like they held her.

  The crew filtered out of the Striker, two at a time, guns at the ready, their initial scans were useless for the other half of the ‘roid, but this side, they could be fairly certain was clear. Cable didn’t seem to be taking any chances.

  Mack slung her bulky fleet-issued kit over her shoulder, remembering why she hated non-atmo repairs. As if the fat rubber fingers of her gloves didn’t make things worse than usual, she had to use tethered tools and most of the time she was working on a clock. Reasonless deadlines annoyed her.

  Cable made her second to last out, with Raza on her six. It was nice to have next to no responsibility, as she was still feeling things out.

  “Clean as a Shemyr virgin out there… up until the barrier that is.” Stacy announced loudly over the comm.

  “And on the other side, it’s likely as spotty as a Jewel Seven whore.” Bezzon chuckled.

  Mack cringed at the idea, but shook her head when she saw the concerned look crossed over Cable’s shadowed face. The visor was not dark enough to obscure in the way she would have liked.

  “You would know, Bezzon.” Raza laughed at her joke and Mack bit back her own as she took in the dead lump of rock they were attached to.

  Cable divided them up, patrols of two, he and Bezzon would scout the sensor-dead sections of the asteroid, Stacy and Peezus would hold down the fort. And Raza would remain her babysitter.

  She wasn’t going to complain.

  With a nod to something she couldn’t hear, Peezus hopped back into the Stryker and linked in with his comm set. No doubt relaying status update.

  Raza signaled for a comm channel switch.

  “You and me, this channel. They won’t be able to hear us unless we switch back, but we can hear them.” Raza gave her a thumbs up. "Just remember, Kenzie Girl, I've got your back."

  "Just call me Mack, okay Raz? Aaron called me that and it's still a little sour to hear from other people."

  "Cable still does."

  Mack shrugged, and looked back at Cable. "He's different. Always has been."

  Cable's override cut out whatever Reply Raza might have offered as he prepped the team to move out.

  Cable pointed to Bezzon and Stacy "I need you two taking the south ridge. We're heading out and I don't want any surprises coming up behind us."

  They moved into the canyon-like path ahead of them, and Mack got a strange feeling. She had no idea why, but she felt vaguely like she'd been there before.

  Which was impossible.

  She shook it off and kept pace.

  In the middle of the group her view was limited to the back of Cable's EVA suit and the gray walls to either side. She didn't know they'd come to a fork in the path until Cable started down the one to their right.

  "Are you sure this is the right way?" She asked, knowing only he would hear her.

  "The scanner's more distorted in this direction."

  Weapon's fire echoed in the distance and her comm cut in with the shouts from Peezus for aide. "Raza. Get Kenzie to the device get it disconnected and destroy it. I'll come back for you as soon as I can."

  Her comm crackled. "Don't worry about it. We'll get this done, and get back to you in five minutes. No more."

  In the bubble of his suit's visor, she saw the concern. Even after all that, he still cared. That, at least she could understand and be grateful for.

  "I promise."

  "Alright. But if I get a chance to come after you, I will."

  He disappeared behind them. They pushed forward. Raza in the lead, proving to Mack just how little she knew about this sort of thing.

  She sprung around corners like a cat genetically crossed with a frog. She knew the leaps were a product of the atmosphere, but the feline grace, that was all Raza.

  "It has to be really tough on him, you know."

  "What's that?"

  "Loving you when he had to... you know, your brother."

  "Cable and I know each other well enough by now that he shouldn't be bothered by my need to process. If he can’t deal with that… then he doesn’t really love me.”

  Mack wasn’t mad. Heartbroken, yes, but not mad. She knew Aaron well enough that while she’d like to say she knew in her heart the allegations were wrong… she also knew that Cable would have fought them with every fiber of his being if he'd thought they were wrong. If she'd been in the fleet when she was scrapping parts of the station... if she'd sold them to the wrong person, she would have been considered a traitor too.

  She shook away those thoughts and focused on the mission at hand. Threading her way toward the source of the disruption. When her handheld when completely wonky, she figured they were too close. She figured the field wasn't paper thin, and tucked the handheld into a pouch on her belt, using good old visual confirmation to find what she was looking for.

  "Mack?"

  Turning, she followed Raza's pointed finger and saw the disruptor.

  It was the ugliest thing she'd ever seen, coils and mesh pieced together in a manner that almost made it appear organic. And it was the most beautiful thing she'd ever seen, Ka tech was one of the few things in the history books you couldn't find in a museum or some boasting collector's private stash.

  Broken, bastardized, and bleeding energy at an alarming rate, it threatened to break her heart.

  Here it was sitting in front of her in its beautiful ugliness... and she had to destroy it.

  "Damn you, Cable." She knew it wasn't his fault, but the overwhelming desire to disconnect it and stash it somewhere for further study or better yet, for potential resale... that was an ache she couldn't quite describe.

  With the revelation of her brother's treacherous acts fresh in her mind... she couldn't bend the rules. It didn't matter if she wanted to play with the tech, and it didn't matter that she was a civilian pretending to be a part of the milits... She had to do as ordered, or face the same fate as her brother. And she recognized the difference she'd noticed in his grief at the beginning, now. As hard as it had been to lose her brother, she could only imagine how hard it had been for Cable to be forced to kill his best friend. She wouldn't do anything that would force him to do the same to her.

  There was something odd about the Ka Tech... well, she supposed that wasn't true. It could be entirely normal for Ka tech, she simply wouldn't know, because she'd never seen it before.

  "I wonder why the fleet didn't destroy this one when they were hunting down the rest of the Ka tech?"

  "It wasn't widely known.” And let's face it. Getting her - as a civilian - would cost you two lives fortunes and it's risky as hell. “There's more than one kind of pirate out in these parts, and we have our patrols... I guess they didn't anticipate it ever activating.... since we wiped out the species."

  Mack pulled on a tether, examining the device to make sure it wasn't rigged to explode or anything. "That's pretty sad in its own right, wouldn't you agree? I mean, if you think back to the earliest of our histories... we do that a lot. Eradicate things, people who oppose us."

  "I thought you didn't get political?"

  "Just making conversation, and let's face it, that's a fact too."

  "Sure. I won't argue that, but the Ka were hell bent on destroying us too. If the history books can be believed."

  "Funny thing about history. The losers doesn’t usually get to tell their side of the story. And our texts aren’t exactly kind about our involvement with the Kas before the war."

  "Doesn't mean the texts don't paint a picture in favor of us."

  "I don't see any rigging. Unless the thing was originally designed to blow up if you destroy it, I think we're safe."

  "One can only hope."

  Raza took a step back and aimed her pulse rifle at the tech as Mack held her breath, crossing her fingers that there
wasn't any blowback. With the lack of gravity, Raza snuggled her back against a rock, turning the intensity setting up to full. She wasn't messing around.

  The gun fired silently, sending its bright slice of energy across the small smooth space and the Ka tech device splintered into a dozen pieces, each spinning silently out into space.

  Mack tapped her comm, "Cable, can you hear us yet?"

  Nothing came back to her and Raza gave her a shrug "Maybe the metals in this rock cut the range of our comms. Stranger things have happ—"

  An electric blue pulse covered Raza and the lieutenant fell limp, her body suspended a meter off the ground by the low gravity 'roid and twisting from the stunner blast. Mack barely had time to see it as she dove behind a wall of rock and wrestled her pistol from its holster at her thigh. The energy bar on the side was bleeding - no doubt part of the disruptors’ effect - but it would do for the moment, especially with her upgrades.

  A crumbling of rock behind her forced her to turn the whole of her body. EVA Suits weren't especially great for this sort of combat. Luckily for her, they were using stunners - not likely to pierce a suit, though stumbling into a jagged rock might.

  She caught a glimpse of one, their suits were.... for lack of a better word: hairy.

  Fibers floated around them, almost as if they were overgrown mammalians with the ability to withstand hard vacuum. But the respirators that obscured their faces told her the truth. She suspected the strange choice of suits was in some vain attempt to scare whoever they were after. And as she tagged one with a direct hit to the chest, she realized the answer to who they were after, was standing alone, among the rocks of this goddess forsaken asteroid holding a slowly draining laser pistol.

  Mack spun, her eyes tracing the lines over the craggy surface of the asteroid. Her breath fogged up the glass on the inside of her helmet's visor. Where was the bastard? She spared a glance at her gun's energy bar. The light was fading to a sickly yellow as it neared the warning range. The thing was draining power like a sieve. She'd only get a few shots before she was out of juice. Damn.

  With her back-up in the shuttle and their comm range cut to less than a click, she was royally screwed. And somehow, the man shooting at her knew it. He had to. It was the only explanation. Why else would he be feinting, drawing her fire, if not to drain her weapon and come after her when she was defenseless?