Girl Gone Nova

by Pauline Baird Jones

  A break in the storm gave her a glimpse of the eye closing on her position. It wasn’t the relief it should have been. It was a window of opportunity Conan and his merry band could use to find her, if they were still looking. It was possible they’d written her off as dead or crazy and left. If she had someone to bet with, she’d have wagered Conan was still here. She should have killed him, but she’d wanted him to wake up in pain. That might have been a mistake. He was both stubborn and delusional. It was a bad combination.

  All around her the storm still raged, but she caught glimpses of the eye as the clouds opened and closed. A flash that was almost but not quite lightning caught her eye. Could it be help? Brief hope flared and died before the clouds shifted again. Usually she liked being right. This time wasn’t one of them.

  Conan had come with the boys.

  In other circumstances, she’d have put money on her ability to hide under his nose, but the storm had done a good job of stripping her cover down to the bare branches. She had his ray gun shoved into the front of her pants. It had been a bitch to lie on all night, but at least she knew it was still there. She lifted her sopping jacket and extracted it. The latest feeder arrived and began emptying its load of water on her head. Through the blur of water running down her face, she heard something new in the storm, something that sent a chill down her back.

  There wasn’t a freight train within a million miles of this forest. Lightning flashed and the chill turned to pure ice.

  A tornado was incoming like said freight train and she was tied to the track.

  * * * * *

  Hel jerked back as the alien ship dropped cloak right in front of him. They were so close, without his phase cloak, they’d have bumped hulls. Four life signs appeared on the surface in the center of the storm closest to Delilah’s position. Had they spotted her? Their position indicated they had.

  He kicked thrusters, backing off from the alien ship. It was risky to transport before she was clear of the storm, but he couldn’t lose her now. He dropped cloak and slammed his hand down on the transport control. The four figures started toward her. Stun energy signatures tracked from both positions, then her beacon disappeared.

  He turned, staring at the place she’d arrive, willing her to make it. The air silvered, then formed into a human shape. If not for her eyes, he wouldn’t have recognized her. Water flowed off her in heavy rivulets, pooling around her military issue, very muddy boots. Her matted hair clung to her scalp. She was filthy, scratched and bruised. He stared at a tree branch tied to one leg. He’d never seen a woman look so bedraggled—or so beautiful.

  He brought up the cloak and went sensor dark. He turned back, would have smiled at her, but she gripped a weapon with both hands and it was pointed at his chest. No sign of recognition flared in her eyes or softened her stance.

  “Delilah?”

  Her body shuddered with cold or shock, or both.

  He kept still, his voice soft. “I thought you’d be glad to see me.”

  She blinked once, and then again. Water ran down her face and off her jaw line.

  “Hel?” Her stance softened some, one hand leaving the partially lowered weapon to rub her eyes.

  He rose, taking it slow, not anxious to alarm her into shooting. He had no way of knowing what her weapon was set to.

  He rubbed his scruffy chin. “I had to become Kalian to find you.”

  The hand holding the weapon dropped to her side. She swayed, even as she tried to smile.

  “Nice timing.”

  “Your friends were getting close,” he admitted, stepping close. The smells of the storm clung to her, hiding her scent.

  “The tornado was closer.” She reached out, her hand touching his chest as if she still weren’t sure he was real. It slid up, a brief loss of sensation until she found his face. “You need a shave.”

  His hand slid down her arm, his fingers closing around the weapon and easing it out of her grasp. He tossed it onto the copilot’s chair and tugged her close. “I need you.”

  “I’m a mess.”

  “You’re perfect.”

  Her laugh broke in the middle. Her arms slid up around his neck. His mouth found hers and passion flared, as out of control as the storm beneath them. He drove her mouth open. Couldn’t get close enough to her to satisfy. He pushed, with his mouth and his body until she slammed into the bulkhead. Water soaked into his clothes, and he could have sworn the air around them sizzled as if touched by fire. She whimpered, deep in her throat. He started to lift to his head, concerned he’d hurt her, but her hands at the back of his head, and her moan of protest, stopped that. One should never disappoint a lady.

  He shoved his hand in her wet hair, turning her head for better access. Passion ran like a molten river between them, and then he felt her tremble and slide away. Her body going limp in his arms.

  He cursed and lifted her, striding quickly to the guest quarters and laying her on the bed. Scratches and bruises marred her pale skin in the places where dirt had washed away. He threw a blanket over her, wanted to stay with her, but an alarm from the bridge sent him running.

  There was nothing to be seen out his view screen, but sensors told another story. The enemy ship had dropped its cloak again for long enough to get their people on board. He’d study the data later. For now, it was enough to know that there were no life signs on the planet surface. He searched for and found brief signs of hyperdrive activation. Tracking showed the Earth ships were close. He needed to leave, but the alien ship could track and follow his hyperdrive trail, too.

  A lot depended on how motivated they were to retrieve Delilah. He half-smiled. He’d left his duties, risked a civil war and an assassination to get to her. They were motivated.

  He kicked on sublights. If he could put the planet mass between them before he made the jump, it might put them off his track until the Earth ships arrived to muddy his energy signatures. He looked at the course, already programmed into his system. His plan had worked as expected—until Delilah’s retrieval. He wanted her. He didn’t know he wanted her that much. He didn’t know he’d want any woman that much. And now he had her.

  The memory of how she’d looked filled his thoughts. Why did he sense that where she was concerned, nothing would ever be simple?

  * * * * *

  When Vidor stalked onto the bridge after their return from the planet, no one laughed or smiled. She’d been so close. On one level he was shocked she’d survived the storm. On the other, nothing about her surprised him anymore. She’d seen them and fired. They’d fired back, but she’d vanished. They had an analysis of the ship she’d transported to: a small trading ship, typical of the galaxy—except for the fact that they couldn’t find it. They’d scanned as long as they dared. It had to have gone dark. It’s what he would have done.

  He’d been ready to try a low orbit to see if they could track the small ship, but they’d picked up an odd energy signature, though just a short one. They hadn’t had to wonder for very long what it was. A squadron of Earth ships dropped cloak close to the planet and moved into a low orbit. The trader ship had been in low orbit, too.

  Then the Earth ships did something even more puzzling.

  They didn’t raise cloak, and they did leave. And the other, un-cloaked Earth squadron they’d been tracking altered course, though it was still headed in the general direction of Feldstar. This was the first, admittedly dubious, indication that these ships knew about, and might be able to track the trader ship that had seized the prize. The squadron’s arrival would have muddied any energy signatures from the trader, but perhaps he didn’t need to find it. If he followed these ships, would they lead him to Morticia?

  If he’d had any doubts about who her people were, he had none now. He considered what he knew of the Earth expedition, both from their history and from studying them during their time in this galaxy. Because he’d had to pretend to be a simple trader did not mean he was one. He could devise strategy, he could react to circumstances and
adapt. He frowned.

  “What are we going to do, Vidor?” Eamon asked what the others were thinking.

  “What we planned. Cadir will take the women, Bana and the new girl child. If you don’t receive my signal, commence the attack as planned.”

  In a very short time he would introduce himself to her people. He would take back what was his and finish what they’d come to do—all of it.

  * * * * *

  Halliwell expected Giddioni to shift his cloak modulations when he left Feldstar, but he didn’t. He ordered all four squadrons to intercept the ship.

  “Cloaks down. I want him to see you coming,” he added. “Carey, you close enough to tell if the Doc is onboard?”

  “Sorry, sir. He’s got a souped-up version of what we’re driving. He’s just out of range and staying that way.”

  Halliwell spun to glare at the geeks. “Where’s he heading?”

  James pushed up his glasses, clicked some keys and then looked up. “He’s headed here, sir.”

  “That’s not possible. He wouldn’t.”

  “He could still change course, but right now, he’s headed here.”

  Halliwell rubbed his face. Now what was the bastard up to? “Don’t lose him.”

  James paled enough Halliwell could see it. “No, sir.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Doc woke to a very déjà vu world of hurt. Déjà vu sucked. So did hurting. She blinked at the gray bulkhead above her. At least it wasn’t a tent, though that didn’t mean the ship didn’t belong to Conan. She frowned. Did she remember seeing Hel—a scruffy unfamiliar Hel who’d kissed the boots off her? Could be a hallucination fueled by wish fulfillment, but it had the feel of a real memory. Just thinking sent a nice burn all through her. She’d feel guilty about kissing him back, but the Garradian influenza wouldn’t kill him. And she needed the memory.

  She rolled to her side and let her legs drop off the side of the bunk. This helped her sit up, something she wasn’t sure she could manage without some help from artificial gravity. Right now a two-year-old could take her with one chubby arm tied behind the back. Too bad she hadn’t hallucinated being sick, though part of it could be simple hunger. She couldn’t remember her last power bar, though she wasn’t complaining about it. If she never ate one again, it would be a good thing. She held onto a bolted-to-the-wall desk when she tried out her legs. They held, but only just. She wobbled to a door and found it unlocked. It opened onto a main corridor. The cabin she occupied was a single, so not Conan’s ship. The thought of him sleeping single in his double bed made her smile. It might have been an evil smile. Without a mirror it was hard to know.

  Her brain spewed out the memory of her last meeting with him, if you could call anything involving a tornado a meeting. Even by her standards it had been a bad twenty-four hours. She’d been scooped up with truly dramatic timing. So she hadn’t imagined Hel. No one did drama better.

  The room was small, not pretty, and arranged for utility and comfort. A towel and a small pile of clothing lay on top of the desk. The other door led to a heavenly sight: plumbing. She’d have fallen to her knees and kissed the commode if she hadn’t urgently needed to apply another part of her anatomy to it. She didn’t bother to pull her pants up. After four days in them, she’d be happy if she never got skin to these ABUs again. She had to tug at the spots where skin and fabric felt like they’d started to grow together.

  The sight of her face in the mirror shocked her, and she wasn’t easily shocked. It wasn’t just the dirt and scratches, bruises and bangs. She’d lost weight, and the bags under her eyes had reached epic proportions. Nasty gash on her temple from that flying branch. If she wasn’t already dying, she’d worry about infection.

  What blew her mind, Hel, the Leader of all things pretty, had said he wanted that. Mister used-to-be-pretty-in-pink had slammed that against the bulkhead and kissed that face until they’d damn near burned a hole in the deck plating. Even her super brain had a hard time wrapping around the notion he liked her that much. Her brain was completely in denial about how much she liked him. It was just another thing to feel lousy about before she died.

  She emptied the various pockets of supplies, and then kicked her ABUs to a corner, since a curb wasn’t available. She had to sit down to remove her weapons strapped to various parts of her body. Kind of ironic that the only item of any use during her adventure with the barbarians was the knife. Took a few recovery minutes before she could explore the shower. Something came out the showerhead, but it wasn’t water. She’d heard of ships that used a cleaning fluid to bypass the water storage problem. Their ships recycled water through a filtration system. It was efficient but best not pondered too deeply, considering where it had been again and again and again.

  In normal circumstances she might have found the fluid a poor substitute for water, but her attitude had been adjusted by life in a plumbing-free zone. The fluid was warm and it was removing dirt. Enough said. She worked fast, worried it might be on a timer. She achieved squeaky clean and had time to lean against the wall for a luxurious few minutes before it shut off.

  The clothes Hel had left were serviceable, comfortable and warm. They would have hugged her body four days ago, but now they hung a bit around the edges. Hel was thoughtful, but still managed to be a guy with a very good eye. Even the slipper-like shoes fit. She finger combed her hair, careful not to meet her eyes in the mirror. She didn’t want to see awareness of what she was, a dead woman walking, well, tottering.

  She’d played girl, pilot, scientist, a cast of hundreds. She’d been who and what she had to be when necessary. Until today doing and being what she needed to had always come naturally. Death was as natural, as inevitable as life, but she didn’t know how to play this scene. She didn’t know how to be while dying. Until this week, she’d never come up against something she couldn’t go over, under, around or through.

  It shouldn’t be a shock to find out she was as human everyone else, but it was.

  Bad enough that the flu was waiting in the wings for her final curtain, did they have to be creeping on stage first? It felt like someone had turned on a blender inside her head. Thoughts spun, dipped, rose and fell with dizzying—and painful—speed.

  Her control was as tenuous as her life. It had been, not easy, but less hard to give her thought processes a name: them. When she was young they had felt like something outside, something waiting to pounce. As she grew older, she realized they lived inside her head, were as much a part of her as her hair or eyes. She’d kept the name as useful mental image, a game she played to keep from falling into the same chaos that had taken Robert. Her parents had never understood the mental challenge they’d created for their offspring when they combined their DNA.

  Both brilliant scientists, they’d easily been able to focus on their respective disciplines. Doc’s brain rejected singularity in everything. Thoughts, patterns, ideas, equations, connections—it all clamored for equal attention inside her head, like a pack of hungry, snarling dogs with her trying to play alpha. Doc couldn’t explain, even to herself, how she managed the data flow. Anything could spin her thoughts off true. The one way her brain helped her, it lusted for connections between those dots, searched relentlessly for them.

  She felt it happening, felt her demons trying to take her to the place where Robert lived, his eyes blank, mouth slack, body twitching. Only instead of dogs circling, now it was a vortex with one, small, calm place she clung to, one place where her brain still tried to connect dots to other dots. And somewhere in that spinning mess was something important, something lost in all that mental clutter, the dross hiding the gold. Unless that was a trick, too. The need felt real, but might not be.

  She clung to that center, knowing she was going to be sucked in, sooner rather than later. She knew Robert’s hell, had seen him go into it and could be grateful that her sojourn there would be short. She just hoped she didn’t fall in front of Hel. For most of her thirty years she’d managed to hide her fear, hide t
hem from everyone but herself. The words they’d applied to Robert were haunted echoes spinning inside her head with all the other stuff: insane, mad, crazy as a loon, mentally unstable, comatose. And the worst: out of control.

  Don’t let them get you, Del. He’d said it to her, but his eyes told her there was no escape. She’d spent most of her life trying to control the uncontrollable. Every time she did the impossible, it was a message to them, a message to Robert. I can do this, even if you couldn’t.

  She hadn’t done the impossible because the Major asked her or because people needed her or even because she could. She did it to keep ahead of them. Had any of it meant anything? All those years of fighting them back, of staying in control and here at the end, they win because she couldn’t die fast enough. The irony of that didn’t escape her. It shouldn’t matter, but it did. It mattered more than dying.

  Everything she had left inside twisted, turned, and searched for some way to control this final battle, but the flu had thrown in with them. She felt thick and slow and stupid. The ache in her temples didn’t help. She was going to fail, but there was one last thing she could do. While she didn’t have an official mission objective, she did need to report what she’d learned during her encounter with Conan’s barbarians. Having a mission objective, even a self-selected one was her mother ship. She slid into it with a sigh of relief. The space was small, like a hurricane’s eye, but it was a place to be while she waited to go out of her mind.

  She heard the hum and felt the slight movement of hyperspace transport. She didn’t know what Hel had learned about her since her capture, but knowing what she knew of him, it wouldn’t surprise her to learn this ship wasn’t on a course for the Doolittle. If she weren’t about to die, it might have been interesting to see if she could change his mind, see if she could outwit him. He was devious, wickedly clever and unexpected. Ninety-nine times out a hundred, she knew who would win in a battle of wits or kicks. Hel was the one she wasn’t sure about. It was, she admitted a bit ruefully, part of his charm. He made her inner bitch want to purr.