“This is one of three working airlocks,” Sully said as we followed behind. “All on this level. They’re going to have to come through here. Now, we just need someplace to hide. I haven’t been here in about six, seven years but, if I remember…”
He did. The corridor widened, just as we’d seen on the schematics, into an open semicircle staging platform edged by a railing lined with hoists and a non-working mesh-enclosed elevator. Somebody had gutted its mechanisms as salvage. But there were stairs, left and right, leading down to a cargo staging area. And one set, right, leading up to another level, its hatchway sealed. It was airless up there.
Sully sent a few glow-globes skimming around, letting Philip and me see the lay of the land. Then he and Del went down the stairs, wandering among the containers in the staging area. Philip and I explored the offices above, the globes staying with us.
Sully found me at the top of the stairs under a globe, waiting for him.
Can you see in the dark? It never occurred to me that he could.
How do you think I always find you in bed?
Funny, Sullivan.
That’s Gabriel, he told me. Sullivan is much more of a gentleman.
I waited for an answering snort from Del and was relieved when one didn’t come. Good. Sully had his filters running again.
There was a three-walled cubicle extending from an interior wall in the open semicircle. Sully liked it and Philip pronounced it adequate and defensible. Del quipped about accommodations fit for a king. Or at least, a prince.
I kicked some rubble out of the way and sat on the dusty decking, my back to the interior wall, rifle across my knees. Philip did the same, a few feet to my left, next to an overturned chair. The glow-globes extinguished, one by one, until only Del, standing by the railing, was bathed in a weak light.
Sully strode heavily into the cubicle, his face and hands barely visible from the Kyi’s energies, and nudged me away from the wall with the toe of his boot. “Scoot,” he said softly.
I moved forward. He sat behind me, long coat flaring out to both sides, then pulled me between his legs, my back against his chest. His arms went around my shoulders. He sighed. “Would you mind putting that,” he dropped one hand down to poke at my left thigh, “somewhere else? At least so it’s not touching me?”
“That” was the Kyi-killer.
I pulled it out of the holster without comment and placed it on the decking between my ankles.
“Thank you. That was extraordinarily unpleasant.”
“That was Tage’s intention.” Philip’s voice floated through the dimness.
Del paced the length of the railing, paced back, boots crunching, pale glow at his shoulder like a devoted specter.
“Ignore him.” Sully’s mouth was warm on my ear. “It would help if you’d shut off your captain-mode for a little while.”
“Not wise,” I countered.
“We’ll have plenty of warning they’re coming. At least, shift down to a code yellow.” He’d reduced his own silvery energies to a muted glimmer.
I did my best to comply but I was aware of every clunk and groan the depot made, every huff and wheeze of enviro. My mind worked over the three major scenarios we’d come up with, then added a few more. For good measure.
Hush. His tongue licked the edge of my ear.
Now that will start a completely different kind of code red, I warned him.
I do take you to the most romantic locations. His arms tightened about my shoulders.
I leaned my head back, tried to stare into the darkness, tried to blank my busy, captain’s-in-command-mode mind. I was successful at neither. I hated waiting.
“Should have brought a deck of cards,” Sully intoned.
Philip grunted. “You mean you haven’t paid for that new shuttle yet out of Guthrie funds?”
Sully raised one hand. “Ah! Just happen to have a deck.” Something flashed between his fingers.
“Any deck you create, Sullivan, I don’t trust.”
“Now, Guthrie, why would you say that?”
“Ren warned me.”
“Thieving swindler. You shouldn’t listen to him.”
“He had much nicer things to say about you. He only called you a high-class cheat.”
“It’s all flattery. Ignore it.”
“He says it’s the only way you can win, since you promised long ago not to use your talents when you two play cards. No telepathy, no matter manipulation.”
That was why Sully lost to Ren, and won playing against everyone else. I smiled to myself. Finally, an answer. “Honor among thieves,” I quipped.
Del stepped in, one softly glowing hand extended, the glow-globe limning his head like a halo. “Walk with me, angel, while the boys play cards?”
Sully tensed, anger prickling against my skin like a rough and scratchy shirt. I flinched involuntarily. He quieted, simmering, fingers stroking an apology.
“Just asking.” Del turned on his heel and disappeared around the edge of the wall.
I heard Philip shift position, waited for him to say something. He didn’t. Neither did Sully. But something passed between them. Then I knew.
“You linked with Sully but not me, didn’t you, Guth?”
A harsh exhale from my ex-husband, then an equally harsh laugh. “I could never slip anything past you.”
“I picked up on Sully and Ren the same way. You don’t sit still when you talk. Even mentally.”
“I wasn’t saying anything nice,” Philip replied. “And I wasn’t saying anything you probably haven’t heard before. Or said yourself.”
Sully squeezed my shoulders, unwrapped his arms from around me. “I need to go have a chat with someone. Guthrie, keep her out of trouble. Scoot, Chasidah.”
I scooted, but not before shooting him an exasperated glance I knew he could sense, if not see. “I’m not the one causing trouble.”
“Let the man do his job, Bergie.”
I leaned against the wall as Sully’s bootsteps crunched away. “So why not link with me too?”
Philip snorted.
“Am I still an issue with you?” I asked him softly. I didn’t want to be. God, I liked him too much. I didn’t want to hurt him. I hoped we were through hurting each other.
“Only that I worry about you. And you don’t need that right now.”
“Are you sure?”
Another harsh sigh. “All right, you want to hear me say it? I failed you, Chaz. I knew I was, but I couldn’t stop it. There was pressure from my family. I was next in line for an admiralty. Out of the action and behind a desk. And suddenly none of that synched with the woman I married who was happiest at a stellar helm.”
I knew some of this, had guessed others. It was hard to think of Philip as the unfavored child, but he was. The Guthries were not a military family. And they didn’t marry career military wives.
“My brothers’ wives, you know what they’re like,” he was saying. “All Guthrie glamour. Pop out the required heirs, go to the required parties. You weren’t like that. That was why I fell in love with you. It’s also why we fell apart.”
He went quiet.
I squeezed my eyes shut even though there was nothing to see in front of me. It was all happening in my heart and in my head. It was amazing how honest one became in the dark. “It was my fault, Philip.”
“It was both our faults. You were so terrified I’d turn into your father. Thad told me…I’m really sorry about Thad, nugget.”
I swallowed the lump in my throat. “Me too.” And it was true. My father’s legacy, my mother’s unhappy marriage, haunted me. “You’re not at all like Lars. But I never gave you the chance to prove that.”
He was quiet again. “So, no, you’re not an issue. Other than being a woman and a captain I admire and respect. I should have made you my first officer and kept it at that. It would have saved us both heartache.”
I swiped at some inexplicable dampness on my face. “I would have liked being first offic
er.”
“Sullivan loves you, nugget,” he said suddenly. “That worries the hell out of me. Not because of what he is, but because of what’s coming at him because of what he is. He knows that. Believe me, we’ve discussed it.”
“He once told me he thought you were the better man for me.”
“We discussed that too. He’s wrong. I’ve been watching the two of you. You have something rare, a closeness. I wish I could have given you that. I don’t know if I could give it to anyone.”
“That’s not true.”
“I’m forty-five this year. I’m set in my ways. And I feel a war coming on. That’s enough to keep me occupied.”
Quick hard footsteps. I jerked upright.
Sully, haze swirling around him, stepped through the opening. “Ship’s coming. Get ready.”
“The lab?” I asked, grabbing the pistol I’d put on the decking, then pulling myself to my feet.
“No way we can tell until it docks. Assume a yes.”
Sully? What happened with Del?
I’m reaching the end of my patience, that’s what. A hard sigh. I don’t know…we’ll talk about this later. After. He’s on our side. That’s all that counts. Just try to stay away from him. Stick with Guthrie. I’m telling Guthrie the same thing.
“Which airlock are they coming in on?” I asked as Del came up behind Sully. The glow-globe moved over the cubicle, bathing me and Philip in a hazy light.
“Same one we used,” Del said, all hint of teasing seduction absent. “Likely for the same reason. It’s mechanically the most sound.”
“Okay. Plan A, then?”
Sully nodded. “Plan A.”
Plan A meant Sully and Del on forward point, Philip and me behind. Kyi could read, Kyi could sense, instantly. In the time it took me to bring up the hand-held and flick it on, they’d know.
I’d back them up with the hand-held. But we needed to know immediately how many were on board and where they were, and what direction they were headed.
The staging area was below us. That was the most likely reason they were here. They were moving things into or taking things out of the locked duro-hards Sully and Del had found. They didn’t disturb the locks. What was in them wasn’t important. And we didn’t want to risk someone noticing they’d been disturbed.
Philip and I ducked behind the debris in the cubicle. My link to Sully—Philip’s link to Sully, damn him—would ensure we’d know who was coming down the corridor toward us. I checked that my laser pistol was set for stun. We wanted them alive, we wanted them talking. We wanted the jukors dead. We wanted their ship.
That was a lot to ask for. If we got half, we were ahead of the game.
It was about five minutes when a vibration shuddered the depot. Docking clamps. Not the solitary one we’d used but a series. I knew the feel, the sounds. They were here for a while.
They weren’t in the hurry we were. They could take five, ten, fifteen minutes to secure their tubeway, get crew on dock. I gave my shoulders a Guthrie roll, listened to the depot clank and groan in response to its new visitor.
Lab ship. A sudden confirmation from Sully, another from Del.
Three command on bridge. Six, eight belowdecks…hard to tell. They’ve got Takas and lots of infants. Jukors. I could feel Del’s distaste. I could be wrong on the count because of that, but I’m not far off.
Six belowdecks, Sully said. Three on the bridge. Anyone belowdecks could be security or command. Takas…four females. Twelve infants.
I felt him shudder. We’d just been through this on Marker and it hadn’t been any easier. And there’d only been one Takan female there. Dying. Sully had put her mercifully to sleep.
But a P-75 could hold many more than that. I counted it a blessing that right now there were so few.
Can we save any of them? I asked, meaning the Takans not the jukors. They were somebody’s mother, sister, aunt, daughter.
We’ll do what we can. Let’s get the bridge staff on dock first.
They’ve activated corridor lights, Sully said as seconds later a light flickered on over the staging area. Then the corridor rang out with noise, bootsteps, voices.
Three. From Del. Two males, one female. She’s the captain. Fancy that.
I felt a flutter of interest from him, then something else familiar, something about a female commander. There was no time for that. I pushed it from my mind.
Wait, a straggler. Del again. Female, heavily armed. Security type. Oh, she’s mine, Gabriel. I will enjoy this one.
I would have clamped my mind shut if I’d known how.
Sully severed the link. I felt it.
But that was dangerous. The link opened again. Del was quiet.
We take them below, in the staging area, Sully said. Del and I will hold them in stasis. You and Guthrie take weapons, comm-links. Then we go to step one.
Step one was taking the lab ship once security and command were neutralized.
The chatter, the footsteps came closer, shifting, changing. A bark of laughter. Then the hollow sound of boots on metal stairs.
Wait for my signal. Sully.
Philip and I were flattened against the short wall of the cubicle. I held my breath, listening, heart pounding, brain running a million ways a minute…
Done. Chasidah. Guthrie. Here.
Philip and I clambered down the stairs, here being where Sully and Del stood before the group of four, two men, two women, all in dark blue coveralls. The glow of the Kyi was bright around them, a glittering, swirling silver. One woman looked slightly astonished. The rest, simply curious.
Del snickered. “I asked her if she knew where I could find a good Lashto and bitter-coffee. She was just about to tell me. Pity.”
I glanced up toward the corridor. “I’m keeping watch,” Sully advised, plucking weapons as I did. They were surprisingly minimal. One laser pistol apiece except for the security woman, who had a dual holster strapped to her thighs, a rifle across her back, a sonic knife, and a small hand laser tucked in an inner pocket of her coveralls.
It was like taking ornaments off statues. Several times I looked at their eyes but they were blank stares. Frozen. I didn’t know what Del and Sully had done. I wasn’t sure I wanted to know. I shoved the hand laser into my pants pocket. The rest of the weapons we piled in the far corner. When Marsh returned, we’d take them.
One of the men’s comm-links chattered. Del grabbed it, tapped it on, holding one hand in the air for silence. Then off. On, then off.
Someone will investigate, he assured us. Sit.
I realized he meant the lab ship’s crew. As one, they sat on the floor. A chill ran up my spine. I turned away but not before I caught Philip’s frown. He wasn’t any more comfortable with this than I was.
“At least there’s no blood, no screaming,” I murmured under my breath as we tucked ourselves behind a row of duro-hards.
More footsteps. The questioning crew member at a hurried pace. An older man, portly. “Sellia! Tarl!” He thumped down the stairs, one arm raised. “What the fuck’s going on here?”
Del stepped out of the shadows. “Don’t you know it’s rude to shout?”
The man spun. And stopped cold.
“Unarmed,” Del said, patting him down. “Med-tech. The others are probably in the lab.”
“Agreed.” Sully nodded to me. “Time to take the ship.”
“I’m going to direct my little party to that office,” Del pointed to his left, “and out of sight. I’ll be right behind you.”
Philip, Sully, and I surged up the stairs, leaving Del alone to secure his newfound friends.
We walked quickly and quietly, single file, sidestepping debris. The corridor looked even worse fully illuminated. If we had to make a run for it, it would be like an obstacle course.
There was always a chance another crewmember would exit the ship. We hugged the outer bulkhead so anyone coming off the ship wouldn’t immediately see us. The dim, flickering corridor overheads didn’t quite
reach there. Sully was a silver hazed figure wrapped in a long, dark coat.
Four still on board? I asked Sully. Someone else could have come onto the depot, gone in the opposite direction.
One on the bridge, three below.
Tell Philip—
He hears what you hear. Just not what you say.
What’s a med-tech doing on the bridge?
Probably not a med-tech. I’ll know more in a minute.
He would. We were almost to the airlock.
He slowed at the yellow striped edge, and then nodded. Clear.
“Not clear,” I said quickly because Philip needed to know. Damn it, I wished he’d linked to me! I pointed up. “They’re using their own tubeway. There will be a vidcam overhead.” I knew P-40s and P-75s.
Philip brushed passed me, stepped into the airlock, laser pistol drawn. He fired. Something popped, sparked. “Problem solved,” he said. “Let’s go.”
So much for subtlety.
We raced through the tubeway—that and the airlock were the most dangerous ambush spots. We needed to clear those. We did, arriving on the lower deck, Sully scanning for any problems. A quick glance left and right confirmed Sully’s information that the long metal-walled corridor was empty. It was a typical P-75 lower deck layout, just as Del’s data detailed it, but with added blast doors to protect the crew if the jukors escaped their pens. With Sully watching our backs, it only took me and Philip a few minutes to trip the lock to the lab’s blast door.
“Go!” I told Sully as the door was grinding closed. We needed the bridge secure.
He took off for the forward stairs. Moments later Philip and I followed, pistols drawn.
Alarms sounded before we reached the main deck. A med-tech, likely, realizing she was shut in the labs. I doubted they expected intruders. No ships could arrive without their notice. System malfunctions as a result of being hooked to the depot would probably take the blame.
But the wailing alarm also covered the sounds of our approach to the bridge.
“Working on it!” I heard an exasperated man reply. “Goddamned systems are fucked up again. Tubeway cam’s out as well. Goddamned power surges with this place.”
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