by Robyn Bachar
“Must’ve slipped my mind. I’ll let you two...” Tomas waved his hands in their general direction. “But no kissing in the med bay. Got to have some standards around here.”
“I’m the captain, I can kiss anybody anywhere on my ship,” she argued.
Gabriel proved her point by leaning in for a soft kiss, and she beamed at him. There was something medicinal in being kissed by the one you loved.
“Ugh. Page me if you need me. I’m going to go bleach my eyeballs,” Tomas said.
“Stay out of engineering,” Lindana called to his retreating back, and he flipped her off. “That’s insubordination.”
“Well, he did save your life,” Gabriel said. “Don’t ever scare me like that again.”
“It only seemed fair after you did the same to me on the Novosibirsk, remember?” she pointed out, and he scowled. “Report, Lieutenant.”
“We have several promising leads based on the information Sveta pulled from the Soviet network. They’ll take time to follow, and all of them appear...”
“Politically problematic?” Lindana guessed.
“Put lightly.” Gabriel sighed and shook his head. “It’s going to get ugly.”
“Well, then I’m glad I have an extra pretty intel agent on my side.”
“Always.” Gabriel raised her left hand and kissed her knuckles, the golden ring sparkling in the flashing med bay indicator lights.
“You know, we could sell that thing and buy everyone new sets of armor,” Lindana said, and then chuckled at Gabriel’s scandalized expression. She winced—it hurt to laugh. “Just kidding. I’m not taking it off. It’s mine now. I took a bullet for it.”
“I love you.”
Lindana smiled. “I know.”
Epilogue
Jiang kept playing the moment over inside her head like a vid stuck on loop. The way Lieutenant Steele’s eyes hardened and his lips pressed together in a thin line, the way Tomas refused to meet her eyes as he rattled off the science of what the brain scan had discovered.
A tumor would have been kinder. It would have neatly explained the blackouts, the lost time, the low-grade migraines that appeared and disappeared without reason. Or a brain lesion, perhaps. Something treatable with another surgery—she’d been through so many, one more would hardly bother her.
It’s the tea, Gabriel had explained gently. Her favorite green tea turned out to be a traitor, hiding insidious codes that activated the remnants of a sensory implant buried in her brain. The implant had sustained too much damage to function properly, so instead it triggered her subconscious. Jiang’s left hand literally hadn’t known what the right hand was doing. And in this case, her right hand had been betraying her shipmates—her only friends, and the closest thing she had to family—and she had no memory of doing it.
She was the mole aboard the Mombasa. She was responsible for Erik’s death.
The lift doors opened and Jiang shifted the equipment bag on her shoulder as she entered the Novosibirsk’s cargo bay. The Blackjack’s primary boarding shuttle was still berthed inside, waiting to be reclaimed by its previous owners, but there was no one left to claim it. Their blood was on Jiang’s hands, and normally she wouldn’t shed a single tear over dead pirates, but the drone strike she had called against the Blackjack had been both her salvation and damnation. Jiang hadn’t even known she’d done it. Oh, she knew that she’d done something to call for backup, that much had been stuck in her brain. But she didn’t truly believe that she had entered the command code into the station computer until Sergei called up the Korolev’s security footage that showed her doing it. Viewing the video felt as though she was watching a stranger walk around in her skin, or a ghost...
Jiang keyed open the shuttle’s hatch and jumped at the sight of Ryder seated in the copilot seat. “What the fuck are you doing here?”
“Preflight check,” Ryder said matter-of-factly. “She’s low on fuel, so we’ll have to stop somewhere close. Didn’t seem right to take fuel from the Novosibirsk, you know?”
“You can’t be here.” From the moment Jiang saw the result of the brain scan she knew that she had to leave. Until she figured out how to stop what was happening to her, she was a danger to her crew—a security risk. Lindana would never ask her to leave, so Jiang took it on herself to do so.
“It’s okay. I’m going with you.”
Jiang blinked. “You’re...? What, no. You need to leave.”
“Correction, we need to leave. And soon, because they’ll notice that something is wrong as soon as I kick on the engines.”
“Why are you doing this?” Jiang was completely baffled. Out of all of her crew members, the chief of security seemed the least likely to offer her help to steal a shuttle. Ryder should be cursing her for her betrayal and locking her in the brig, not helping her leave.
Ryder shifted and studied her. “Well, I could say that you need my help, but I don’t think you do. Not in the typical way, at least. You don’t need hired muscle, and you’re more than capable of taking care of yourself. But you need someone who trusts you to watch your back while you’re figuring out what happened to you. I trust you. So I’m going with you.”
“But I...” Jiang trailed off. “New Hong Kong,” she blurted out. “We’re going to New Hong Kong. Not first, because we don’t have the fuel, but if I’m going to find answers they’ll be there.”
“You got it, boss.” Ryder grinned. “Strap in.”
* * * * *
Acknowledgments
Huge thanks and much love to my family, who continue to allow me to be the madwoman in their attic.
I continue to be blessed with the best BFF ever: Diana Baxter. She was the first person I told when I received my very first contract offer, and she has been a huge part of my life and my writing journey since. I am so grateful for her love and support.
Along the way I’ve met fabulous authors like Devin Harnois and Sasha Devlin, who inspire and encourage me. You both rock!
A big thank-you goes to my editor, Deb, and the Carina Press team.
And finally, the inspiration for the world of the Galactic Civil War owes its thanks to Dr. George H. Miley of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. I was privileged to work with Dr. Miley on his memoir, Life at the Center of the Energy Crisis: A Technologist’s Search for a Black Swan. I was fascinated by Dr. Miley’s stories of doing nuclear research during the Cold War, and editing Black Swan started the what-if gears in my head turning. Those what-ifs became the bones of this setting, and for that I thank him.
Coming soon from Robyn Bachar
and Carina Press
The Galactic Cold War: Contingency Plan
The Galactic Cold War: End Transmission
Also available from Robyn Bachar
Bite Me
Just One Spell: The Sephra’s Tear
Bad Witch: The Emily Chronicles: The Importance of Being Emily
Bad Witch: The Emily Chronicles: Poison in the Blood
Bad Witch: Blood, Smoke and Mirrors
Bad Witch: Bewitched, Blooded and Bewildered
Bad Witch: Fire in the Blood
Cy’ren Rising: Nightfall
Cy’ren Rising: Morningstar
Cy’ren Rising: Sunsinger
About the Author
Robyn Bachar enjoys writing stories with soul mates, swords, spaceships and vampires. Her books have been finalists twice in the PRISM Contest for Published Authors, twice in the Passionate Plume Contest and twice in the EPIC eBook Awards. Robyn enjoys rolling twenty-sided dice, playing rock-paper-scissors and slaying creatures in video games. You can find Robyn online at www.robynbachar.com and on Twitter, @robynbachar.
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ISBN-13: 9781488028199
Relaunch Mission
Copyright © 2017 by Robyn Bachar
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